33LIMA

You mentioned installing CFS3 in Admin mode...good. But did you also set the CFS3 installer - 'Setup.exe' on the first CD probably, you know, the one you ran in Admin mode - to XP compatibility mode first, by right clicking and selecting 'Properties'/Compatibility, before selecting 'Run as administrator'? With Vista putting the CFS3 files that don't go into Program Files into a different folder from the one XP uses, that might be the prob. You mention deleting files from just these Vista folders so maybe that's not it at all. OFF hanging at the point you describe seems a pretty sure sign that it was a duff CFS3 install the first time too, whatever the cause. Shouldn't be too hard to get CFS3 installed & working in vista, I'm on Vista 64, no probs.

You mean, like anti-aliasing isn't working? Or maybe it is, but needs set higher? I have a combination of the highest monitor resolution I can apply (1600x900, set in the OFF Workshop (CFS3) config option) and 4x or better anti-aliasing (set in the graphics card driver, and to 'over-ride aplication setting' [Nvidia] not the config option and apart from the rigging wires on some planes the edges look smooth enough to me, and the hi-res aircraft textures are pretty sharp too. Would go higher on the AA setting but hits my FPS too hard (8800GT). I see there's a new download which supposedly enables AA without an FPS hit, haven't tried it myself: http://combatace.com/topic/67108-fxaa-fast-approximate-anti-aliasing-for-nvidia-gpus/

Lucky you, I'm too late for a change of career now (short of an enforced one!) but would always have loved to work at an airport in about any capacity, nearest I ever got was my now ex-wife being first info desk then cabin crew, always loved any excuse to watch the planes, and once got a cockpit jump-seat ride in a BAC1-11 including final approach and landing at LGW. There's just something about those big birds, however work-a-day they are, prop or jet, military or civilian, the magic of flight and all that. I think this qualifies to sing "The High Life', here you go: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnReqwF9YAI The very best of good luck, and watch out for the Hun in the Sun.

On German pilots in English, 'Wings of War' by Jasta 35b's Rudolph Stark is probably one of the best, aerodrome discussion here: http://www.theaerodr...-you-think.html Not a lot of technical detail (tho his description of the Pfalz DXII seems to crop up everywhere, so perhaps it's better than most) and covers 1918 only but pretty good. If you don't mind the author's 1930s style, 'German War Birds' by 'Vigilant' (Claude Skyes) is a good series of affectionate pen pictures of German fliers in various theatres (Skyes translated my edition of 'Wings of War'). Everyone should have at least one von Richtofen book and if I had to have just one, I'd probably still pick 'Richthofen - the dramatic true story of the Red Baron' by William E Burrows. It doesn't have the day-by-day, kill-by-kill detail of Killduff's MvR books but more than makes up for that in sheer, draw-you-in readability. The account of the duel with Hawker and MvR's near-fatal shoot-down in July 1017, are effective little masterpieces of descriptive writing which put you in the cockpit. Next best would be Harleyford's 'Von Richthofen and the Flying Circus' by Nowarra and Brown, first published in 1958 but lots of excellent photos and decent line drawings of about every type of plane Jasta 2, Jasta 11 and JG1 ever flew. Osprey's recent WW1 'Aircraft of the Aces and 'Duel' titles are also pretty good, some interesting accounts, great pics and excellent colour profiles.

Brilliant Stephen, looking really well!

Hi Stephen by the little fillet I meant the 'triangular' metal fitting behind the cowling each side, that sort of blends the cowl into the fuselage and may be a duct. It looks noticeably more conspicuous on the model compared to the pics. Possibly it's just my imagination, no big deal. The Windsock pic is the only one I've seen with the decking between the cockpits. In the Crowood book none of the 2-seater 10s or the 12s have it. I wonder if decking was unusual. The other thing compared to the Windsock pic is that none of the Crowood pics show the wire brace between the rear centre section struts having the apex pointing down - all have it pointing up, to the upper wing, as per pics 1 & 2 below, of early 2-seater 10s with the hole in the top wing for the observer. And later-production 10s, and all the 12's pictured, have that triangular brace replaced by a roughly semi-circular hoop between the struts, as per pic 3 below, stated as being done to provide easier access to the front cockpit because of a change in aileron control lever position, and changing the triangular brace would be rather defeated by having the decking in place. So I wonder if that Windsock pic is a unusual example, Or perhaps the Crowood pics are unrepresentative. If you had the cockpit entirely open between the vertical sides, the front of the pilot's position and the rear of the observer's position, as per these pics, ie no decking at all around the cockpit, just a 'bath-tub' you might not need to elevate the ring of the Etévé mount. Again, no big deal. Anyway another lovely plane, two more in fact, great work already!

...enjoy, thanks to Naxzull666:

VERY nice indeed! Hope the following observations may be helpful. The little fillet behind the cowling each side looks a bit big, most pics I've seen show it a fair bit smaller. The Etévé mount looks very good apart from the circular base ring being raised above the cockpit sides. From all the pics I have seen, the cockpit on both the 10 and the 12 2-seaters was a single, 'communal' one (like the Halberstadt CLIII) and did not have the curved 'decking' between them which is visible in the model pics. The Nieu 10 could be a two seater or a single seater, and could have the observer in front (Nieu10AV) or to the rear (10AR) so you could make a 2-seater 10 as well if you wanted, and even with alternative observer positions. Would be nice to have the centre-section in the 12 with 'transparent' covering to make a point of difference with the 10; the Crowood book on Nieuports says most 12's had this because they had the pilot in front from the start where visibility was not too good. Another possibility would be to give the 12 a Nieuport 17-style full cowling (without the little tri-angular fillet each side) which would add another point of difference and make the 12 look a bit more modern and more attractive. Lovely model and a good choice of plane, which suits both AMF and RFC.

Yes that's the one; the RE8's upper wing extensions seem to have failed. Nothing fake about that one.

Those pics look convincing to me - no sign of tracer smoke trails and the attack is not from the classic behind and below position...but they don't look too 'posed', the markings look authentic (remember the staged Luftwaffe pics of a captured Spit with the roundels too far in from the tips, in the position of crosses on post-1939 Bf109s) and given the SSW's engine's unreliability and its tendency to turn over on landing - even when maintained and flown by its rightful owners - how likely is it anyone would have used one with authentic markings to stage these pics? As for other real combat pics, can't find it now but there's a poignant, real photo of an RE8 B5073 going down vertically just short of the ground, after a run to drop ammo to troops (reportedly something they dropped got stuck and jammed something important). There is a photo of the wreck in Time Life's 'Knights of the Air' with some Tommies carrying away what's said to be one of the dead crew and another is standing to one side with what may be the body of another. Edit - here's the crash site pic, can't find the other one: http://cas.awm.gov.au/item/E04888

When they jump the original pilot figure is still there from what I can see. It's like they're carrying unauthorised passengers - 'Look, we're going down in flames now, and there's no point in both of us getting into trouble, so out you go, there's a good fellow.'

I tend to agree with Olham. There is more than enough good historical non-fiction to be read on any war-based theme without much if any need to resort to fiction, however well researched. I did read Len Deighton's 'Bomber' and not only found it a very absorbing read despite being fictional, but also thought it brought the characters to life in a way you only get in the very best non-fiction books - like Pierre Clostermann's 'The Big Show' which, especially in its complete edition, I think is much the best combat pilot memoir I've ever read or hope to read - not to be missed. The final chapter is truly tragic and very moving, in a bitter sort of way. It takes an exceptional piece of writing by someone like Clostermann - or Arthur Gould Lee, in his different way in 'No Parachute' and 'Open Cockpit' - to give history that extra layer or richness so I would not rule out reading historical fiction - there's just too much good non-fiction still to read. Will one day make an exception for 'Winged Victory' because it was written by someone who was there and is perhaps more of a fictionalised account of VM Yates's actual experiences in WW1 air combat, but having leafed through a copy of 'Goshawk Squadron' I got the impression is was strong on a sort of modernised version of 'Dawn Patrol' angst, and rather short on air combat. Also make an exception for 'Biggles' too, a glossed-over 'Boys own' version of course but again written by someone who was there, at the time, and at the pointy end.

I fly in the external, 'spot' view pre- and post-combat. Looks good and I reckon it compensates for sitting in a cockpit with no peripheral vision. Do this in shooters too, ie use 3rd person view and switch to gunsight view when shooting, for much the same reason; one reason I dislike shooters with no 3rd person view. Anyway maybe it's my setup (now have a respectable 512MB DDR3 8800GT in place of the 256Mb DDR2 9300GS) but in external view, planes are rendered significantly smaller and much harder to see when in external view. If I swicth to un-zoomed, cockpit view, they look much 'closer' and are easier to see. I tried Olham's FOV tweak but didn't get a noticeable improvement in the external view anyway. So I edited my working viewui.xml file (in [username]/Appdata/Roaming/Microsoft/CFS1 Over Flanders Fields) to replace my stock settings for the Spotview, here: <SpotView ViewDist="10.625" ViewVerticalOffset="0.0" NominalAngles_x="20.0003693993873" NominalAngles_y="-50.0651212984645" VerticalDelta="80.0" LateralDelta="80.0" ZoomDelta="10.0"/> ...with these, which are the ones from the CFS3 ETO Expansion, except that I have kept the horizontal/vertical delta at 80 for a faster pan rate: <SpotView FovScale="1.0" ViewDist="16.875" ViewVerticalOffset="0.0" NominalAngles_x="-11.5640145232585" NominalAngles_y="-105.305504107789" VerticalDelta="80" LateralDelta="80" ZoomDelta="5.00" ZoomMin="5" ZoomMax="300"/> What this seems to have done is that planes now look the same size in the spot view as they do in cockpit view ie the former look closer/less zoomed out and are easier to see. I found I had to re-enter this edit after playing around with other settings in Workshop changed it and lost the desired effect. Early days yet but if the effect holds it will improve one of my main issues with OFF, ie poor aircraft visibility when flying in external view without use of labels/TAC (I fly with TAC set to 1 mile but at aircraft, and turn labels on rarely, hate to have to do either purely to see before it's too late planes I know are there eg in Archie bursts). Have also reduced the size of the TAC and have just grabbed Olham's viewui.xml mod which I see already did this plus softened the labels nocely.

At the moment with the FM and DM mods applied, I'm getting an awful lot of crews jumping out of planes that either are not on fireat all (effects slider at 5), or just go on fire briefly and then the flames go out, but meanwhile the poor sods have jumped anyway. Have seen this in Strutters and FE2s and I think in other Allied planes too, in my current Jasta 5 April 1917 campaign. Seems to affect at least half my kills (sorry, claims). They don't fly on, they spiral down (fairly gently considering the stick jockey left the hot seat) unless missing important stuff like wings. Anyone else seeing this?

As I fly mostly German scout campaigns, choose short missions and fly silly ones like (for German scouts) railyard attacks as Line Patrols instead, at the moment I'm flying with fuel management rather than unique skin. I find the lightweight AI a big irritation, whether I can catch them or not. I just find it annoyingly unrealistic, and an unsatisfactory way of compensating for other AI limitations. For me, it spoiled CFS3 as a dogfighting (tho not as a fighterbombing!) sim so I guess it's just a pet hate. I can still choose a 'flight skin' and I don't see my flight mates so closely that it's really noticeable they're identical, so no big deal losing the unique skin. Besides which, unique skins are really needed only for German and to a lesser extent French squadrons. If the AI flew with fuel and ammo loads I would probably fly with unique skins and full fuel. I have no information as to what is realistic. From various sources it is obvious that Jastas were quite often scrambled to intercept enemy incursions reported by observers and am inclined to wonder whether tanks would have been filled up every time, unless a longer-range mission was specifically planned or expected for that day. Except at those times and places where flying 'barrage patrols' was the favoured tactic. Three-quarters full might have been more realistic, perhaps varying from unit to unit, location to location, period to period; does anyone have any sources, I wonder? Anyway, regardless of what the practice was, until the AI start flying with fuel and ammo loads, it's fuel management and flight skins for me. Flying RFC/RAF campaigns, or German 2-seater campaigns, is a different kettle of fish, I tend to top 'em up because of the longer missions involved, but don't bother switching to 'unique skin', PC10 is PC10, and a flight skin is good enough.

Nice find Olham! The assessment of the Roland in Gray and Thetford's 'German Aircraft of the First World War' is taken directly from that report; no wonder it got an order as a back-up for the DVII. There's a nice freeware DVI available for First Eagles/FE2:

The 150HP SPAD 7 was definitely at the front from late August 1916 and in action from at least September. See Squadron Signal 'SPAD Fighters in Action', for one; while Osprey's 'SPAD XII/XIII Aces of WW1' gives as December 1916 the date of Georges Guynemer's letter to SPAD designer Louis Béchereau in which Guynemer said 'The 150HP SPAD is not a match for the Halberstadt' . The former records that Guynemer flew the SPAD for the first time on 4 September and that Lt Pinsard got the first SPAD kill on 26 August with one of the first production machines. Like the SPAD XIII its rate of entry into service would have been limited for some time by the many problems affecting both production and service (like the radiator makers running out of raw materials in October) but SPAD 7s were flying and fighting in Autumn 1916. Unless I'm flying a SPAD myself I'll stick to the 150HP and 200HP versions, will help rein in those AI flying without fuel or ammo loads. Another good mod HPW!

My OFF manual doesn't seem to mention this command, which might actually be quite useful, at least if, like me, you play with padlock and hatswitch rather than tracking s/w. Ctrl+` (that's accent key) = target attacker - supposed to target whoever's shooting at you. Was looking for a way of padlocking different attackers with the TAC/radar turned off, but it seems you must have the TAC on, to either start padlocking or to switch to a different target, which I find a pain as I prefer to leave the TAC off. So thinking of keeping it on, with range set to 1 mile, as it's probably a reasonable simulation of what you (or your flight) should be able to see and compensation for the lack of peripheral vision sitting at a monitor (and what I find to be the indifferent aircraft visibility range in CFS3/OFF - with no 'radar' I can be right in the middle of the AA bursting around enemy planes, before I can see them unaided, not good). Found this command in the manual for CFS3 addon 'Mosquito Combat' which also says the range at which you see things on the 'radar/TAC is affected by the system's estimate of what you should be able to see given clouds etc (and also your pilot's 'health', interestingly): http://www.contactsa...03%20manual.pdf It makes the point the CFS3 'radar' is less 'God-like' than the CFS2 version, which is good. Confirms my inclination just to leave it on most of the time, and not feel I'm cheating, so long as I keep the range at, say, 1 mile. Anyway the Ctrl+` key may make it easier to pick out quickly who's shooting at you, will try it out at next available opportunity.

PPS reducing the Brisfit tail RollingCoefficient a bit more didn't help much but now have all three at N28 settings and she takes off slowly but fine, tho not keeping up with the AI till she's airborne. Will apply this to all other 3rd party planes that won't takeoff on Hard FM - the Sopwith Triplane is another one. Thanks for the tip Ojcar!

PS just changed the BrisFit's RollingCoefficient numbers from 0.35 to 0.30 (main gear) and from 1.0 to 0.8 (tail) and I can now take off! The tail seems to be the one that made the difference - initial acceleration was VERY slow (better than not moving at all, as before the change) but as soon as I could get the tail up, she accelerated away quite smartly! Will reduce the tail to 0.7 or 0.75 which should do the trick.

Quick comparison of RollingCoefficient: Bristol F2B (3rd party planes which doesn't move on takeoff if flown by player on 'Hard' FM): Left and Right main gear = 0.35 Tail gear = 1.0 Nieuport 28 (3rd party plane which takes off ok in above situation, maybe not quite as sprightly as the stock planes but fine): Left and Right main gear = 0.25 Tail gear = 0.7 Albatros CIII (3rd party plane which also takes off ok in above situation, observations as above): Left and Right main gear = 0.06 Tail gear = 0.70

...maybe useful also also for those 3rd party planes stated to be 'optimised' to fly on 'Normal' FM - with the [player] FM set at 'Hard', I find some of these planes - the Bristol F2B for example - stay stuck to the ground when you try to take off, some of them move forward very slowly, others sort of 'waddle' on the spot as you open the throttle, while the AI planes, flying on their default 'Normal' FM presumably, manage to take off. Sort of the reverse of this problem.

PS don't see Ctrl+` in the keyboard command file (Mine.xca) but it does have this: <Key ID="Tilde" Mod="Control" Action="TargetLastShooter"/> ...which might be the same thing, except it it Control plus the 'Tilde' key (the wavy line above the hash key, on an English UK keyboard anyway). Will assign to a joystick button and experiment to see what works.