33LIMA

Not interested in playing any game or sim online, so the lack of that feature in WoFF, or its presence in RoF, is not a factor for me. At the moment I'm spending most of my sim time working on stuff for Britpack '44-x for Panzer Elite. Apart from firing up Atlantic Fleet for the odd sea battle, most of the rest of my sim time is being spent playing one of my current PWCG campaigns in RoF, which I find provides a different but not massively inferior SP campaign experience to WoFF. Will be back with WoFF when the fancy takes me and I have more time to spare.

Hauksbee, we should not condem WW1 planes based on pilots - often inexperienced - who 'gave a dog a bad name' because they were flying machines they could barely control based on poor, primitive or limited flying training. I cited an expert opinion (backed up by a demonstration) on the DH2 in a mission report, and reproduce this again here: "Led by Lanoe Hawker, No.24 Squadron (DH2s), Britain's first single-seater scout squadron, arrived in France on 8 February 1916 in great excitement but was immediately absorbed in a crisis of its own. The day after their arrival, one of the flight commanders, on the first flight of a DH2 from a French airfield, got into a spin and failed to recover. Five days later, another pilot spun in, and this time the machine caught fire. It had happened before, earning the DH2 the grisly sobriquet of the 'spinning incinerator'...Hawker responded by taking up a DH2 and, according to his biographer, spinning it from every conceivable angle, engine on and engine off, and demonstrating how, with correct remedial action, and provided there was sufficient height, it always recovered." Ralph Barker, 'A Brief History of the Royal Flying Corps', Constable & Robinson, 2002 Granted, actual or alleged prone-ness to being crashed by novice pilots - or more experienced ones who are careless or unlucky - is one criterion for judging the effectiveness of a wartime aircraft, but is not necessarily the most important one. I don't have it to hand, but in the Profile Publications DH5 booket, a pilot is quoted acknowledging that the type was a better machine than its reputation indicated.

Friend or foe, Biggles is a well-travelled fellow, in sim-landl! :)

See: They say it's an historical skin, of a pilot in 46 Squadron IIRC, but I reckon Biggles has a secret admirer, in the WOFF artwork department :)

Mmmm...looking at that screenie, I'm tempted to track down my Crimson Skies CD and see if I can get her up and running!

One of two Sopwith Pups shot down (both in flames) on a single mission, current Jasta 11 PWCG campaign, September 1917: This was the other one - he tried to get away, but the flames grew and he keeled over and fell to earth in a near-vertical spiral: I'm also meeting Camels, and got this one: Home sweet home - the airfield of Phalempin, with the nearby factory chimneys making a good reference point: There's little time for rest, though - I'm soon off again, leading another patrol up to the lines, in fine weather thank goodness. Tommy, beware!

Jaguar en route (SF2 NATO): Mirage airborne (SF2I, stock 6-Day War campaign):

A short hop over the 'lake' map (a multiplayer haunt?) in a (for me) very-rarely flown plane, the Gotha.. My front gunner seemed a bit blasée about the whole thing... ...but I moderately enjoyed the trip, especially after I had begun to dump the bombs, and the kite felt slightly less barn door-like... After that, it was quickly back to life as Richard Hippel with Jasta 11...

Any of the campaigns in European Air War. Because they feature(d): 1. The theatres I am most interested in (Battle of Britain and the daylight air campaign against Germany). 2. The ability to fly in a great selection of fighters from the above. 3. The ability to pick from a selection of historical units that operated each of the above types. 4. Reasonably large formations. 5. Decent map and audio briefings. 6. All the trimmings like a log book, awards, convincing menu screens like a nosy hangar and a Nissen hut type billet with a radio with selectable wartime music and background noise. These days, campaigns (static or dynamic) for IL-2 mods like Dark Blue World come the closest to the EAW ideal for me, with much superior visuals compensating for fewer trimmings - campaigns like this one, and this one. Well-written briefings for campaigns composed of fixed mission sets can more than make up for more 'dynamic' features, while the scripting can add variety you just didn't get in the somewhat repetitive EAW campaigns. For World War 1, I find I get as good or better from both Wings Over Flanders Fields and Rise of Flight with Pat Wilson's Campaign Generator. Both hit the WW1 equivalents of most of the reasons I gave for favouring EAW campaigns. Ditto for modded First Eagles 2.

Couldn't resist posting this one - a simple 'over the shoulder' shot certainly, but it has a nice sense of purpose, direction and depth, with the aircraft in the foreground, superimposed on the cloud in the middle distance, and both overlaid on the terrain which rolls out towards the invisible horizon. And it encapsulates how Rise of Flight brings us back to...well, to the rise of flight, with the airman alone in the vastness in his fragile plane, as he flies towards the ultimate visible representation of the horrors of war, not knowing what fate awaits him over the lines...

Some say the wings come off a bit often, but I don't mind. The fellow in the Sopwith below might disagree, though...

Age of Sail (AoS2, anyway) was rather good, I thought. It would still be on my HD and played when I fancied a bit of Napoleonic naval action (sic) - if I didn't get ugly banding in the skies. The music score was so good I left it playing during gameplay, with the ship's bell sounding merrily at intervals. Anything MP only, I'm not interested in, however pretty.

Glad you like the reports, and trust you will also like WoFF if/when you take the plunge! Gotta get back to earth for a while now, I've still got missions to make for Panzer Elite's upcoming Britpack '44-x mod.

There is a photo of a model which looks to be of the actual aircraft in the pic Olham posted, in the July 2017 Airfix Model World mag, in a note about an upcoming IPMS exhibition. I think the model is the same one illustrated on East Midlands Model Club's site, here: http://www.eastmidsmodelclub.co.uk/uploads/1/3/4/6/13468680/albatros-bii-rnas-1024x681-1024x681_orig.jpg Only difference seems to be the lack of a roundel on the model's tail The model's roundels have plain red outer rings - and the image info says it's an Albatros B.II, RNAS! So it was a captured aircraft, all right, but possibly not by the Russians! EDIT - there's some info here on the Aerodrome - apparently it is believed to have been a pre-war purchase: http://www.theaerodrome.com/forum/showthread.php?p=11723

The Lebed 12 was supposed to have been based on captured German aircraft, and from Stephen1918's FE/FE2 version, I think we can see a clear resemblance to the Albatros B-type, despite the different motor:

Imperial Russian cockades on the Nieuport 17 in RoF, Tarnopol autumn map: And on Stephen1918's Anatra DS in First Eagles 2, Lemberg map, summer:

There was I... ...well on my way home, with two out of three flight-mates having managed to find me and tag on behind. Except that they weren't flight-mates. They had two wings, not three. More Huns! They were Albatrosses again, this time with blue tails. Now, I was in real trouble – alone against two, at under 5,000 feet and not quite yet over friendly territory. I ran for a bit... ...but the Huns slowly gained on me, so I turned to meet them. I picked the nearest Boche and got into a turning fight, in an effort to get him quickly and even up the odds at the outset. This proved impossible, for the Hun kept up his speed and while his turning circle may have been wider, his rate of turn seemed just as good. And the longer I stayed in a turn, the more the drag of my three wings seemed to give the sleeker biplane a greater advantage, getting around the circumference of his outer circle faster than I could get around that of my smaller, inner one. I tried to counter this by going vertical with a low yo-yo. That did the trick and I got some rounds into him. He sheered off, but now rounds whacked into my machine, in turn. I looked around for the second blue Albatros but could not find him, at which point I was hit again and realised that this time at least, I was under MG fire from the ground. I quickly re-oriented myself and fled westwards. Over No-Man’s Land the second blue-tailed Albatros caught up with me and round and around we went again. This time, though, it was his turn to be hit by ground fire! As I watched, I saw his nose drop and down he went, in a vertical dive from under 500 feet. Did he pull out? I didn’t hang around to find out, but sped away to the west. I’ve been re-reading from my books of RFC and RAF daily communiqués – ‘Comic Cuts’ as they were known – and I know well enough that many a hostile machine reported optimistically as 'going down vertically' wasn’t actually shot down, but I have a feeling that particular Hun had fought his last battle. Serves him right! I was soon leaving the shelled area behind me, with the unspoilt countryside of northern France opening out again below and around me. The sense of relief was very real – from the point we spotted the two-seaters, the transition from a cross country flight to a fight for survival had been rapid and unsettling. Behind my tail, all was now clear... ...but looking out ahead and to the right for the nearest friendly airfield my map revealed, I saw two specks, low down and about a mile off. At first I thought they were making a bee-line for me. But as I watched, I was relieved to find that they appeared to be making a gentle approach to the same airfield I was making for. The fact that no-one on the ground was shooting at them was a further indication they weren't more Huns up to no good. In fact, they might have been from my own flight. I was soon making my own approach, keeping an eye out for traffic. The other two aircraft may have been making a circuit or coud have flown on, for I didn’t see them again. I was soon back on terra firma, switching off in front of the canvas hangars.Time to introduce myself to my hosts and call Squadron to report my whereabouts and seek news of the others, before asking the fitters to check my machine before I set off on the last lap back to la Bellevue. Back at base, I claimed one Hun definitely shot down, and left it at that, on the basis that the Albatros with the dud motor was high enough to have glided back into Hun-land. I was, however, much relieved to find that all three of the others had made it back, and had in fact claimed another Hun. All in all, not a bad show and an all together more satisfactory one, than I'd had flying a very similar mission in the alternative Rise of Flight universe. That's no reflection on the relative merits of two great WW1 combat flightsims - I just put it down to the fortunes of war!

I have seen trains, usually soon after takeoff, just not on the runway, as sighted by Jim - someone of a less charitable disposition than I might wonder if this was possibly during a joyride after a liquid-fuelled BOC mess party Once en route, I find that trainspotting - or giant glove puppet spotting, for than matter - is not conducive to avoiding being shot down, which happens enough to me, without making it any worse

A fighting finalé... I managed to get there in time and shot the Hun off my flight-mate’s tail.The latter then seemed to make himself scarce, leaving me to deal with the second red-tailed Albatros, who seemed a tad cross with me for interrupting his attack, not to mention for having seen off his friend. This fellow seemed if anything more detrmined than the other Hun not to get shot down. However, I had the better aeroplane for the turning fight that quickly developed. He was hot stuff, though, and he managed to turn inside me when I pulled around too hard to get my gun onto him in a hurry, without balancing the turn. By now we were quite low and being more patient, I tok it a bit easier, and allowed my better turning circle to bring him back around and into my sights, more gradually. I got some hits on him and he reversed his turn. This didn't do him a lot of good. I overhauled him steadily, snapping out short bursts - with head-bobbing active, it takes more skill to line up your shots, without going to the gunsight view, a feature I like as it seems much more like you're in a three-dimensional world sitting in a manoeuvring aircraft, not sitting at a bitmap superimposed rigidly upon a moving monitor image. Sensing victory, I throttled back so as to stay behind him, rather than having to break and stop shooting. This did the trick. His wing structure suddenly collapsed and he disappeared somewhere under my nose. His friend might have well glided to safety, but this machine now had the gliding characteristics of a streamlined rock, and wasn't going anywhere, except down, down, down. Time to go home! There isn’t a fully-functional ‘recall’ command in WoFF and anyway, there was nothing to be seen of the rest of my flight. So I oriented myself and turned west, towards friendly territory. By this time, I had lost a fair bit of height and drifted over the enemy’s reserve trenchlines, happily still high enough to avoid ground MG fire. Behind me as I sped homewards, a smudge of dirt and dust near some trenches marked the spot where my erstwhile foe had crashed to earth. As I flew west, Archie did his best to stop me getting away. At which, glad to say, he failed. He did, however, play a part in deterring me from having a go at a nearby enemy kite balloon, which I left unmolested behind me. The excitement wasn't quite over yet, thought! ...to be continued!

Back on patrol! My parallel Triplane campaign in Wings over Flanders Fields is not a new one – this mission is the second in a campaign started for ‘Sopwiths over Flanders Fields’, but left ‘on the shelf’ since that mission report. The show featured here took place later on the same day, 1 May 1917. It was a patrol over to the lines from our airfield at la Bellevue, and my squadron was 'Naval Ten, rather than 'Naval One', as in Rise of Flight. I’m not yet using JJJ65's Mission Editor which enables you to do things like control the number and identify of flight-mates as Pat Wilson's Campaign Generato does in RoF. I was happy neverthelss to find that I was allocated three companions for the trip - not too many, not too few. I did use WoFF to reduce our fuel loads to 80%, to lighten our aircraft from the outset. As is common in WoFF, ‘A’ Flight was taking off with us, supposedly to fly ‘top cover’ (one of those slightly jarring post-World War One terms, like ‘Intel’, that WoFF uses in a few places) although whether or not you see them after take off is doubtful, unless you conform to their movements. Which I usually disdain to do. Having ticked the ‘Always lead’ option, I was in charge of ‘B’ Flight’s four Triplanes. For some reason, I had picked a ‘skin’ for a machine from 9 Naval, rather than from my own squadron. Unlike RoF, the WoFF weather is often dire, but today was bright and sunny, with little cloud cover. I’m experimenting with some of the settings in Ankor’s indispensable DX9 feature which accounts for my nice, glossy Triplane. The head-bobbing and mouselook Ankor has added to the original dynamic shadows make it much more attractive for me to spend more time in the virtual cockpit, as I do in RoF, and less time in the external view; so the shine wasn’t too distracting. Also as in RoF, the short flight times and pleasant visuals make flying the mission in real time a pleasure rather than a chore, although from la Bellevue, we had rather longer to go than in the RoF 'parallel' mission, to get to the front. On top of that, when we got there, nothing much seemed to be happening. All around us, the skies were clear of any sign whatever of other aircraft. As we reached the front, having got to somewhat under 10,000 feet, I turned right so as to fly east-south-east down the trenchlines, hoping we'd bump into something, sooner or later. Still the skies remained obstinately clear. The sun was behind and to our right, so I threw in a few random course changes to reduce the chance of somebody creeping up on us, unseen. But nobody did. I began to think that this was liable to be one of those parties the Huns weren’t going to join – a ‘milk run,’ to use another anachronism (one I haven’t seen in WoFF). One of my gentle zig-zags took us a little closer to Hun-Land, and this attracted the attention of Archie, as the RFC called AA fire. The black bursts seemed to be good for line and height and kept going, so I opened up and led us in a climb to put them off. No point tempting fate. Archie soon gave up, only for another battery to take over, just as we were coming to the southern limit of our assigned patrol line. At that point, scanning the blue skies all around, my gaze lingering in the direction of the sun, I noticed a group of specks above and behind us, to our right, on the friendly side of the lines. There seemed to be four of them, in a V formation. ‘A’ Flight has showed up after all, I thought to myself. But I kept a watchful eye on the newcomers, mindful of Mick Mannock’s tenet that sighted aircraft should be taken to be hostile, until proven otherwise. Sure enough, a closer look revealed that they were Hun two-seaters, possibly DFWs. While I was making up my mind whether to turn left or right to get at them, the decision was suddenly taken out of my hands. A small, fast biplane whipped in from our left, coming straight at us. He was a Hun in an Albatros V-strutter, and he wasn’t alone! Our attackers were at least two Albatrosses. What they may have lacked in numbers, they made up for in aggressiveness. Their red tails and noses seemed to explain their feistiness – they were from von Richthofen’s circus, no less. I picked out the nearest one, gave the order to attack – just in case anyone was in any doubt – and the fun began. I avoided the Hun’s first pass and after what today would be called a flat scissors, with each of us turning into the other repeatedly to try to get the other out in front, I managed to get above him. I rolled over and into him and made several attacks, before zooming back up. From the bits and dust that flew from him, I could see that I was getting hits. After maybe my third pass, the V-strutter broke off and flew away, wings level, slowly losing height. After clearing my tail and seeing that the other Triplanes seemed to be holding their own, I went after my Hun and made another pass. As I broke away, I saw that his propeller had stopped turning, so I left to return to the fight, where I could see a solitary Triplane being pursued by another Albatros. So far, so good, but the fight wasn't over yet! ...to be continued!

A winch truck, skillfully camouflaged as a giant glove puppet! Now I see, makes perfect sense really. Another mystery, de-mystified :)

Dunno. I see that it's based on a non-fiction book, which is a good start, but from the trailer, it looks a bit tightly-wrapped for my taste, and perhaps a tad self-indulgent or heavy-handed, a war film child of our times.