ETO Battle of Britain campaign Mark II

[33lima]

Down there somewhere are Huns - possibly the same Ju88s I didn't officially see, earlier. I start handing out attack orders, which are accepted. So the boys must reckon they're Huns, too.

Then it's my turn. Down I go, in a very steep corkscrew, chopping the throttle so as not to leave my wings behind. I may need them later.

I admit that if it wasn't for padlock, I wouldn't be able to see the aircraft I'm chasing at this point. It wasn't previously marked red in the TAC, so it could be one of ours.

But no - as I close in, I can see that it's one of those pesky Ju88s. I let him have it, and he returns the favour.

We're both hit, but he's hit harder. After breaking away, I can see him going slowly down, trailing lots of leaking fuel and/or glycol. He pitched over and went in soon after this picture was taken.

Meanwhile, the others are doing quite well, judging from the R/T chatter. But my own engine doesn't sound or feel right. I have the notion that I'll need to get down somewhere, and sooner rather than later.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Revs, temperatures and pressures all look ok, but they don't tell the full picture - something doesn't feel right.

I know I'm still close to the airfield at Rochford, so I begin a turn and start to look around for it.

It's behind me, so around I go, chopping the throttle, holding the nose up and letting her sink into the turn to lose height and speed. I'm not counting on being able to make anything other than a straight in approach.

Once again, my undercart has to be hand-cranked down in steps, and the flaps won't go down at all. To cap it all, my motor conks out as I come in, aiming between the fuel dump and some blast pens.

With no flaps, I'm once again coming in too fast, but I'd rather overshoot than undershoot, from this approach! And that's exactly what happens. I bounce gently and then float gracefully across the grass and over the perimeter track.

I can see that there's dead ground directly to my front and I sail out over the edge then drop about twenty feet. Down at last, I start jabbing the brakes and manage to grind to a halt just before running into a railway track. This is getting to be a habit!

I got credited with that bomber, but the mission was another wash-out, and my Spit, a write-off! Things can only get better...I hope!

 

[Daiwilletti]

Stirling Work Chaps

Another top-notch mission report 33lima! Thanks for all the valuable feedback. I need to look at the intercept.spawns because I flew a mission last night where the mission objective failed to show up as well. Not 100 percent what can cause it - my best guess is that if there is a slightly dodgy option in one of the spawn.xml files (for example a formation that is not usually used for aircraft), then the die roll fails and there sometimes isn't another die-roll for a while. Although sometimes with a campaign mission I've had the objective pop up minutes late. Another possible reason for a failure is if the aircraft chosen to spawn also has some fiddly little problem with it - for example, if it lacks the MissionType in the loadouts, corresponding to the mission directive for the spawn. Goodness knows - there are so many variables in this exercise!

There is an entry available for use in the game.xml - "GoalSpawnRetryInterval". Trouble is I don't know the format. I've tried the "00:00" format, but maybe the "00:00:00" format works. If I could get that working reliably one of the bigger bugbears of CFS3 would be fixed!

As far as the German Invasion goes, as mentioned it is not too hard to influence the length of time before an invasion is attempted. Firstly under the alliances in the campaign.xml is an entry <SI SR="8"/>. At a guess the SR= Strategic Reserve. By making this a low value such as 1, an invasion could be delayed.

Secondly Production Center Production Values could be reduced so that the SR is not built up too quickly: <ProductionCenter Name="Hamburg" Sector="F46" Value="12"/> is a stock value.

Thirdly and perhaps most importantly, under CampaignParams is the value RoundsToInitOffensive="0". Here a value of 1800 @ 60 rounds per day would delay the invasion to at least one month.

Stay frosty up there!

 

[33lima]

So I've got jackbooted stormtroopers stamping over large swathes of Essex, and a few keystokes could have delayed if not prevented all that, with no need to fret over beach defences, counterattacks or even winning air battles???

One for next time - having been invaded within days of starting both my play-throughs of the ETO BoB campaign, I reckon such campaign.xml tweaks to be absolutely essential! Sealions in July should be 'right out'!

Anyhow am playing on with this one in the meantime because (i) it may throw up some other possible tweaks and (ii) it looks good and is a lot of fun. Will also start the BoB Alpha version soon, and run in parallel, as I want to try out rince33's larger formations and experience that mod, too.

 

[Daiwilletti]

One for next time - having been invaded within days of starting both my play-throughs of the ETO BoB campaign, I reckon such campaign.xml tweaks to be absolutely essential! Sealions in July should be 'right out'!

After throwing together a few files to help improve BoB campaign play, it looks like I will need to include all your valuable feedback in something a bit more extensive! By the way, do you happen to know some representative airbases geographically located in the center of 10, 11 and 12 Groups? These airbases could be used to trigger appropriate squadron spawns for each group.

Also could you suggest a hurricane and a spitfire squadron for each group? If you take a look at the ETO's ai 3gb hurricane set and ai Spitfire set there are a fair few but I'm not sure which ones were attached to each Group. Maybe I should read the xdps! It sounds like youve done a fair bit of reading around this.

NB I've tried a few tweaks to the intercept spawns but unfortunately it is still not completely reliable - very frustrating when a mission objective spawn failure might mean jack-booted hordes thundering around Essex.

 

[33lima]

Will come back on those queries. Squadrons were moved around to an extent, as well as often flying from forward 'satellite' airfields rather than the Sector (ground controller ops room equipped) airfields which were their home stations. So I can pick based on an available orbat around Adlertag. Re a spawn-triggering airfield in each sector, depends if it would be best to have one near the coast (say Warmwell, for 10 Group) or more central (say Middle Wallop ).

The map below might be as good a source as anything, showing both bases and who was there.



Whatever else can be managed (and I wish I could be more use here not just writing cheques I can't cash!) two essentials would I think be:

1. campaign.xml tweaked so that starting on 10 July, and regardless of how badly the player performs, invasion of England is not possible until at least a week after the Luftwaffe got serious on Adlertag, later if the player is not completely hopeless (with invasion of France being possible if you've basically wiped the Luftwaffe from the skies, chased the Kriegsmarine from the seas, and bombed the French coastal zone into the consistency of fine sand); and

2. Some way of enabling the RAF player to chose between starting a fighter campaign in a Spit, or a Hurri, or a Defiant or a Blehneim If - which might be an edit to the techtree and if really necessary, four cloned campaigns to restrict the choice to one particular A/C. Abacus did something to try to ensure the player got a Mossie for their add-on, although I see the FAQ say if you get changed later to a Spit IX, that's because 'the campaign has a mind of it own...if you want to continue to fly the Mosquito, you will have to request a new aircraft. You can do this as soon as you have 5000 prestige points'. Even if - as in real life - you have to accept the fact you might get transferred to a squadron flying a different A/C, better taking that chance for the sake of being able to chose your mount freely, either by choosing a campaign which reliably starts you on just that A/C, or enables the player to pick between the four, at the very start, without having to rack up points first. . That capability would be a big step forward.

PS looking at the Abacus Mossie Combat manual I see that have managed to allocate RAF squadrons to Groups, not as in stock CFS3 to Wings, which would be good to do the the Battle of Britain. Poking about in one of their three dynamic campaign files might be revealing.

 

[33lima]

the 3gb AI Hurricanes readme says they represent squadrons which served with 11 Group so any of them would do for that Group.

I see it includes 249. They came south from 13 Group to 10 Group on 15 August, flying from Boscombe Down, not far from Middle Wallop. They only moved to 11 Group (North Weald) at the start of September so suggest 249 to represent 10 Group.

As for 12 Group, I'd suggest 229 Squadron. While later moved to 11 Group, they were in 12 Group at Wittering in August.

 

[33lima]

As for AI Spitfires, I'd suggest 92 Squadron for 10 Group; they were at Pembrey in S Wales for a while, moving to Biggin in 11 Group by September.

Sailor Malan's 74 Squadron was at Hornchurch in August and so would be ok for 11 Group.

As for 12 Group, 66 Squadron was at Coltishall during August so would do for that Group.

 

[Daiwilletti]

OK, got that, 33Lima. Thanks for the good juice. On the choice of available aircraft, the thing is that if you have say four aircraft set up with the same entered service date (.xdp), and have the same entry date to the campaign techtree, then you can manually select which one you wish to fly, without needing Prestige Points. The way the campaign is currently set up, is you do the hard yards in a hurricane, before either getting enough points to select a Spitfire, or you survive one month until the Spitfire becomes automatically available.

It is a bit of a test of stamina etc just to add a "degree of difficulty". However it would be easy to tweak a campaign so that say four aircraft joined the techtree at the same month. In that case, I think the campaign engine would select the default aircraft as the one whose xdp had the earliest entered service date but it might be random. To achieve full parity will require yet more "one off" tweaking of aircraft xdps to homologate entered service dates.

To go much further into representing Bob, one needs to provide the suite of geographically located facilities that trigger appropriate air spawns. That is not too tricky.

The next thing though would be to create an entirely new country.xml where each Fighter Group is listed - so is treated like a "nationality". Then QC locations would need to be tweaked - it lists available airbases by nationality. Also cutscenes would need to be tweaked - it also lists airbases by nationality. Also UnlimitedPilots, pilotattributes.xml, and a new global_layer.csv with the "owner" column (lists by nation) listing the Fighter Groups as owners of the airbases. That aspect of CFS3 does not seem to work as intended - notice how in Era 3 or 4 campaign, you can be flying a British aircraft yet still be assigned to a USAAF base? Frustrating because if that worked better it would be easy to get the right aircraft at the right airbases.

 

[33lima]

Thanks for the gen. I will try a test campaign with the four British day fighter types as <Date Month="9" Year="1939"/> in the campaign's techtree, and their .xdp files (with regenerated .bdps) set to EnteredService="9/3/1940" (the war for Britain having started on 3 Sept '39).

It's a pity the .xdp entry date can't be kept at their true historical service entry date to avoid possible unintended consequences outside the campaign but possibly a low risk, especially if the war's start date is used for aircraft in service as of that date. I doubt if anyone is making campaigns for RAF aircraft that start before then!

The original campaign's builder arranged things so that the skin for the Hurricane 1 had squadron codes (JX) which corresponded with the squadron that the campaign allocated me to. I don't know how that was arranged (assuming it wasn't just a co-incidence) but when I tweaked the campaign file to get a Spit, that also happened (the MkI's skin was for 609, and that was the squadron the campaign allocated me to). Ideally if I start a new campaign and chose a Defiant or a Blenheim instead, I'd want the same thing to happen eg the ETO dayfighter Defiant is coded PS so I'd want the campaign to post us all to 264 Squadron. If possible. Separate campaigns for each type might be the only answer. The important thing is the player gets to choose type and squadron; whether they choose by picking the campaign, or by picking after they start a campaign, is less important.

 

[Daiwilletti]

Too Many Wingmen

Here's another gem from the CampaignParams section of the MJ BoB (Allied).xml campaign: C_WINGMAN_REPLACE="5"

Although the unlimited pilots and .cmpstat files might produce way too many pilots, you can reduce this number and keep to the diminishing pool as the campaign progresses, by putting in C_WINGMAN_REPLACE="0". As attrition inevitably happens (this is war, you know), the number of available wingmen will reduce quickly.

The zero entry may even allow editing of the list of pilots in the cmpstat file, without them being replaced in the next mission.

 

[33lima]

Thanks for the tip, edit applied. Will see how it works out, possibly not well if it means we never get any replacements - I might end up glad of having forty-odd to start with!

 

[Daiwilletti]

of course, you can also just use a lower number, like 1.0 or 0.5

 

[33lima]

609 Squadron Martlesham Heath, morning of 12 July 1940

This time, we're scrambled to intercept a raid a few miles to the south-west

The conditions low down are a bit murky, as you can see.

As we settle into formation and onto course, Bogies appear, heading in the opposite direction.

I believe the TAC displays what your pilot is able to see, taking into account his spotting abilities, which can improve. Looking directly at the Bogies, though, I can see nothing. This is where WotR's 'dot mode' for labels comes in handy.

The absence of the purple arrowhead marker confirms that although these Bogies are likely Bandits, they're not our target. So I reluctantly carry on...

...and we're soon coming out into clearer skies and climbing hard.

Here's hoping I didn't miss a Hun-bird in the hand, for the sake of one in the bush!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

We're climbing through about fifteen thousand...

...when I turn on the TAC again, simulating communications with the Controller back in the Sector Ops Room. This confirms we're now close to our target. In fact there's two groups of Bogies, and it looks like the ones to our direct front are the fellows we've come here to get.

I roll in towards them as they slide by to our right, tapping out attack orders as I go.

Finally, I can see them with the good old Mark I Eyeball - a straggling formation of about half-a-dozen aircraft. At first I think they're fighters, but then, I realise they're Stukas!

That leaves the slightly worrying possibility that the other Bogies are the escorts. But we're committed - and in we go!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

I'm soon rolling in behind my own intended victim.

Rounds fly back and forth as I close in, but my aim isn't very good...

...and I break off leaving the Stuka flying on...

...with another of his kind to his left.

Conscious that I've made a bit of a mess of my first pass, I come around in a wide sweep, determined to get my man this time.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

I pick a different Stuka for my second target, but let him go when one of the boys nips in ahead of me and goes for the Hun.

I quickly switch targets and this time, my aim is much better.

By the time I break off, the Hun is blazing nicely.

There's another Stuka ahead and left and I go straight for him. A few bursts and down he goes, too!

The fighting hasn't been one-sided though, and I'm conscious that my kite has collected hits on every pass I've made.

She's still answering the controls, the motor's running fine, and I'm not out of rounds yet. There are still some Huns around too, so after making sure everyone else has a target allocated, I look around for another one for myself.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

My victim drops like a stone, losing his tail in the process. And all around, the Stuka party is still in full swing.

Back on goes the TAC, for a bit of extra situational awareness. This confirms that the centre of the action is just to my right...

...so I bank in that direction. Each time I hear someone on the R/T advising they're rejoining, I pick another target and order them back in.

This time the action has shifted to a lower bunch of Huns, probably the ones to our left when we tackled the first lot. They, too are Stukas and I've soon picked out one of them.

My rounds whack into the Hun and he rolls left and sideslips away.

One of the others decided to finish him off for me. Which is fine, they all count regardless of whoever hammers the nail in the coffin.

Time to pick another partner, before the party fizzles out!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

My next target doesn't last long. A couple of short bursts take off his tail and down he goes.

I swing in after one of his friends but break off when my ammo finally runs out. I take a few more hits for my trouble.

A check of the map reveals there's an airfield just to my south-west so I turn I that direction. Time to get down before something stops working! As I go, I hear the rattle of MGs behind me. One of the Stukas is trying to get onto my tail!

I soon shake him off and very quickly, the Hun has other things on his mind, as one of the boys lets him have it.

The Stuka is soon in flames, even as another one tumbles from the sky, tail-less.

I reckon I've bagged three Huns and the boys at least as many more, from what I remember hearing on the R/T. Now, I just need to get down in one piece!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

It doesn't take me long to reach the nearby airfield, which turns out to the bomber base at Wattisham. By now the squadron seems to be finished its business with the Huns, so I order them to leave me and concentrate on getting down myself, in my well-holed Spitfire.

I'm at about two thousand and the engine's still running smoothly, so I slow down and set myself up for the two turns to the left that will settle me onto my approach.

After the first turn, I make a quick scan of the instruments, the engine ones in particular. Uh-oh! The speed is coming down nicely, but although the engine note sounds muted, the revs are up at 3,000. That can't be right!

The engine note drops further and although she's still turning, I can feel the power draining away. What's more, the undercart remains up despite all efforts to drop it. Flaps likewise. Just as well perhaps, because even without the extra drag, I've got less height and a lot longer to go to the airfield than I'd like, with no power.

About all that's working are the landing and navigation lights, as I stagger towards the perimeter track.

I try to flare but my damaged wings seem just to want to drag me down. I hit the grass hard - and there's an immediate fireball!

Despite this, it seems I'm unharmed. And we're credited with a mission success, with no less that four Stukas credited to Yours Truly! But I've learned my lesson - don't push your luck too hard, after your aircraft has been damaged in combat!