ETO Battle of Britain campaign Mark II

[33lima]

609 Squadron, Martlesham Heath, evening, 12 July 1940

The sun's well down in the western skies when we get our next call-to-arms. This is to intercept a raid to the south, in the outer reaches of the Thames Estuary.

After taking off to the north as usual, I start a wide sweep around towards the south. Looking back, I can see the boys are catching up tolerably well.

I settle onto the required Vector and level off so they can slide into formation...

...which they soon do, albeit with the exceptionally wide spacings so beloved of CFS3's AI. Then it's onward and upward we go.

As we near Clacton on the coast, the rumble of artillery can be heard. Though not visible in the pic below as I timed it wrong, you can see shellfire bursting on England's normally green and pleasant land. The invader still has a foothold in Essex, obviously, though from the briefing map, his bridgehead seemed to have shrunken a little since last time.

However, our business lies further ahead and out to sea.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Clacton-on-Sea is soon slipping astern of us. By now, we're at nearly twenty thousand feet, which should be at least high enough.

Correcting my course to the right, I call up the TAC, but all is clear.

Our to our left, there's nothing but the apparently empty expanse of the North Sea.

Soon after, Bogies are reported ahead, but they turn out to be Hurricanes, lower down and on a reciprocal course.

The countryside behind us is shrouded in an evening haze as we press on.

I hope those Hurricanes haven't chased off our Huns!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

In another few minutes - I'm flying this one in real time - we're at the interception point, but it seems the Huns have stood us up. Bad show.

We're vectored straight back to base, so it looks like this one is going to be a wash out. Disappointed, I decide not to loiter, so around we go...

...and are soon heading back whence we came. There's a bit of excitement when more bogies are reported...

...but it's just those Hurricanes again!

Down on the water, something's up. I see no ships, but there's an odd, ragged line of shell splashes on the water, far below.

I decide that there's no point in us treading on Coastal Command's patch, so I let it go. Soon after, we're back over Martlesham Heath and the boys peel off for landing.

We get a right telling off for the failed interception, which I can't help feeling is terribly unfair. We just went where we were sent. It's hardly our fault the Huns decided not to show up. Oh well, better luck next time!

 

[33lima]

609 Squadron, Westley, morning of 13 July 1940

We've been moved! Gone are the creature comforts of a solidly-build and well-appointed pre-war RAF station. We're now at a base whose facilities are more reminiscent of a civilian flying club - realistically so as I later found out, since RAF Westley was the requisitioned premises of the West Suffolk Aero Club. Four Spitfires are already airborne; the other four lined up and ready to go. Our target is a raid not far to the south-east.

You can see what I mean about the base in the next pic. No blast pens and what's worse, no officer's mess.

At least it's a fine day, apart from the odd shower tumbling from the scattered clouds. And we don't have far to go.

Settled onto our course towards Ipswich, I throttle back and level off so the boys can catch up. To our left, I can see the bomber base at Wattisham, at which I recently force-landed. It's a pity they didn't move us there, but Bomber Command evidently can't or won't make space for us.

Once we're formed up, I push the throttle forward and begin to climb hard. We don't want to get caught short of altitude on our short trip to the interception point.

Won't be long now!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Six miles to go and the TAC/Controller tells us our target is slightly left of our current track. And aircraft are reported just to our left, the white colour telling me that they are visible, but not yet identifiable. I gather your ability to spot and recognise aircraft as displayed on the TAC improves if you allocate to your vision some of the 'experience points' you earn flying CFS3's campaign missions.

In fact, the newcomers are well bombed-up Junkers 88s a few thousand feet lower, probably at around Angels Ten.

I'm not officially aware of their identity so act accordingly, the choice being between 'investigate' and 'ignore'. I opt for the latter - the raid we're supposed to intercept is still just ahead of us and that's what we're sticking with, I decide. 'Selection and maintenance of the aim' is after all the most important of the Principles of War - the ones I was taught, anyway.

This time, there's neither sight nor sound of fighting on the ground. We need to remember where the front line is from the briefing map, as we never seem to bother marking up our in-flight ones, perhaps because they could fall into the enemy's hands. You'd think, though, that the enemy would already have a pretty good idea where the front line was.

Be that as it may, the ground below remains peaceful.

Another check with the TAC/Controller suddenly complicates the picture! Our target is still ahead and closing, but there's now another group of Bogies to our right, on a roughly reciprocal course.

This bunch is a bit more dangerous. Fighters, Messerschmitt 110s in fact, and at close to our own height.

Faced suddenly with this lot, in the heat of the moment I forget that I haven't officially identified them, and decide to engage. I mustn't leave a threat like this unanswered. I can't see them directly - this is where WotR's dot-mode label would be useful - but I start ordering the boys to attack, and then pick one out for myself.

Time to get busy!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

My chosen Hun cuts underneath me...

...and I pull too tight in an effort to get onto his tail. The blackness closes in and I ease off to late, ending with just a spot of light in the centre and then, in utter, complete darkness. For what seems like ages, I'm a blind passenger in an aircraft that could be doing anything. Vision returns at last to reveal I'm going nearly straight up...which is an awful lot better than nearly straight down.

I return to the chase, careful to pull less G this time. Even so, the edges of my field of vision are still darkened, as I latch on again to the 110, who goes up into a steep climb.

I loose off a burst at the Hun, who converts his climb into a tight left-hand turn. This gives me the chance I'm after and I quickly cut the corner, without pulling back too hard this time.

Now let's what eight Brownings can do to an Me110!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

I give him a couple of long-ish bursts and the Hun disappears in a brief cloud of smoke. When he emerges on the other side, I can see that he's on fire!

My shooting has evidently been rather better than usual - the burning Messerschmitt has taken quite a lot of hits.

He heels over to the left, still on fire...

...and is last seen over on my right, going down steeply and clearly doomed.

So far, so good!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Looking around, I can see another 110 down near the deck, but he's already got a Spitfire for company.

Undeterred, I'm soon chasing down another Messerschmitt. I get some hits from return fire, but soon set him ablaze.

Suddenly, rounds whack into my kite! I flip her wildly over onto her side and try to clear the line of fire. Just behind me, the 110 responsible for my sudden predicament has rolled inverted in an effort to keep his sights on me.

I know I've been hit hard and should probably just clear off and save my skin, before something important stops working. But my assailant has lost height and I conclude that I had better go onto the offensive one last time, otherwise he'll get me.

I roll around, pull back on the stick and drop onto him like a hawk. He tries to turn into me but I get my guns onto him as he flashes past. This works out quite well for me; not so well, for him.

Not yet having realised he's finished, I'm in the act of pulling up after the Hun...

...when I realise that my damage has caught up with me. The revs drop off like water draining from a bucket that's full of holes. Not a good time for that to happen!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Pulling lots of Gs with nose in the air is possibly not one of the better times to experience a complete engine failure, especially if you're disorientated through watching a Bandit. If what happened to me is anything to go by.

The good news is that I'm very close to an airfield. The bad news is that I get distracted again by having to use the emergency system to get the gear down. And the flaps won't work.

I manage to come down in the middle of the airfield but despite fishtailing desperately and even throwing in a very risky tight, low flat turn, I'm quite sure I'm going much too fast. It's scant consolation that there's always somebody worse off - like whoever that is, fireballing on the skyline.

I go sailing across the perimeter track despite dabbing on the brakes. Then standing on the brakes, when I realise they don't seem to be having the slightest effect.

I pull back on the stick in an effort to dig in the tail wheel, but that just gets me airborne again, before flopping back down. Finally, I come to halt, just short of ramming the scenery. Again. This time, my kite doesn't burst into flames, so there's that.

At the debriefing, I'm not surprised to be roundly abused for missing my tasked raid, but confident that my decision to divert to those 110s was justified in the circumstances. In fact I'm credited with three of them, so I feel quite smug. This time, though, I will be sure to divert any experience points gained to improving my G tolerance. Wheeling about the sky in complete blackness, unable to see even your instruments let alone the people who are trying to kill you, is definitely not my cup of tea.

 

[33lima]

609 Squadron, Westley, morning of 14 July 1940

We've been given the afternoon off and our next call is the following morning - to intercept a raid near the coast, north of Ipswich. It's early, but the weather is beautifully clear. Despite which, my Spitfire is determined to give a good impression of a particularly well-lit Christmas tree.

A quick glance at the TAC shows we've nearly thirty miles to go, as the crow (or Spitfire) flies.

Westley is soon slipping away behind and below. Hopefully, its insignificant appearance will deter the Huns from paying it a visit.

Anyhow, the boys are soon in what passes for formation.

The sun is low in the eastern sky as I open her up and begin the climb up towards the oncoming enemy.

Whatever the morning has in store for us, we won't have to wait long to find out.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

We're still a few miles short of the interception point and climbing more gentry through about twenty thousand when I hear the crump of nearby Ack Ack fire. The enemy seems to have expanded their bridgehead into Suffolk and now, their fire tracks us as we fly on.

Irritated rather than alarmed, I check with the TAC/Controller. This confirms that the raid is coming in just left of our track, near the coast at Orfordness.

I leave the TAC on and next second, Bogies are reported, just ahead. The skies are clear at our level, so they must be below us. This looks like our target!

This is it! I snap out a series of attack orders, then chop the throttle and spiral down after the Huns. There's a long way to go - the enemy aircraft are at about five thousand. I pick up on one as I come down. They're very hard so see against the ground but I reckon they're Messerschmitt 110s, possibly fighter bombers supporting their ground troops.

By the time I get down to their level, the first kill is being claimed over the R/T. The air fight has quickly spread out - there are aircraft all over the shop. One of the boys reports he's re-joining, so instead, I send him after my own target, trying to ignore the Ack Ack fire.

This is all a bit confusing, but so far as I can tell, it seems to be going reasonably well for us...so far.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

Having passed on my target and being in no immediate danger than I can see, I spare a second to watch, as one of two Spits chasing the 110 opens fire. The leading edges of his wings light up with the muzzle flashes of his eight Brownings.

Confident of the outcome, I decide it's a good time to check my tail. Behind and to the right, two distant aircraft are curving in behind me!

This turns out to be a single Spit engaged with a single 110. The latter is hit and the Spit breaks away. However, the Hun, though clearly wallowing, isn't wanting to go down just yet. So I decide to help him make up his mind. He's a sitting duck and after a couple of bursts in a single pass, the 110 appears to blow up!

In fact his starboard wing has come off at the root. That'll teach him!

We seem to be running out of Huns, but for all the right reasons. Time to see if there's any mopping up needing done, before we go home for a late breakfast.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

What looks like the last 110 already has another Spitfire chasing him down.

I climb up and cover him from above. The 110 tries hard to get away...

...but not hard enough.

And then there were none! The squadron begins to form up behind me, as I climb away.

The warm, pleasant feeling of a job well done is rudely doused with the proverbial cold water when one of the boys reports he's been hit hard! The ground fire has got him!

The Spit goes down, levels off, and flies on for another minute or so, slowly losing height. Any hope he's going to pull off a forced landing goes up in smoke, literally, when he hits the deck and blows up.

Thoroughly chastened, I speed up and alter course to the north, to clear the flak zone. Nasty stuff, and I'll not underestimate it next time.

Unfortunately, CFS3 crashed when I exited the mission, which hasn't happened before. That put the lid on my remaining hopes of being credited with a successful mission. I'll be able to resume from an auto-saved game, but may have to go back to the start of the day again; we'll see.

 

[33lima]

Pending the next mission report, I'll permit myself the observation that what's most missing so far, as regards elements needed for a credible Battle of Britain experience, is that the Luftwaffe seems to be sending over one or more small flights (staffel strength or less) when it should be sending over raids of a credible size and composition.

I know there were exceptions, but a 'default' raid strength of anything less that 20-30 bombers in a single formation (approx. strength of a gruppe, which was the German operational unit, not the staffel) is just not credible for the BoB. Preferably with at least one staffel as close escort, 80% of the time. Two or three staffeln would be more realistic but might hit playability if the RAF can't be made to regularly spawn a second or even third squadron to intercept most raids.

Luftwaffe fighter sweeps, supporting a raid or not, should never be less than two staffeln - if you run into one of those and you're unsupported, you're in trouble and that's as it should be, you should try to avoid them unless you have them at a disadvantage.

Luftwaffe fighter staffeln were smaller than RAF squadrons and it would be fine for them to put up two schwarme of four, 8 A/C total, on any given sortie.

So it's a lot of fun at the minute, but it's more like CFS3 with a Battle of Britain setting, than fighting the Battle of Britain in CFS3. Bigger formations as suggested above is the single thing most needed to change that for the better, based on my experience thus far.

I'm really hoping this will make it into the BoB mod update, whether in the form of scripted mission sets or better still, in the dynamic campaign as well. Throw in the ability to choose your aircraft freely at the start and the icing's on the cake.

 

[Daiwilletti]

Hi 33Lima, your visual posts are great as usual! And the issue of aircraft formation size is not too hard technically.

What I would envisage is an extension of current spawns which Rince33 and I have been experimenting with. The thing is, starting small provides proof of concept.

The Intercept missions you fly usually have a small fighter squadron appear (in red, not a mission target) and a main mission objective, in purple, usually a bomber formation.

This is achieved by putting two spawns, separated by a comma, into the one line in the spawn table file intercept.spawns.

To get more aircraft, you can make the numbers bigger, but also add more spawns to the one line entry in the intercept spawn table. That is needed so you can provide different altitude settings. In that way you can get closer to the imposing "stacked" formations of bombers that you see in some of the original footage.

But I bet it takes a lot more time to write a coherent spawn set than at first glance!

 

[33lima]

All sounds very promising, Daiwilletti. Fighter sweeps clearing the sky ahead of a raid is good to see.

In stock campaign missions, your squadron often gets a top cover (another 8 A/C) escort, flying above and behind and it would be good if (i) most times, raids had this (simulating its close escort) and (ii) sometimes, the RAF player also got another squadron flying top cover (to simulate two RAF squadrons intercepting the same raid together - Park switched to trying to send in 'paired' squadrons about the time the Germans increased their escort size, and other times two or more squadrons would be vectored to intercept the same raid, even if not arriving at the same time).

 

[33lima]

609 Squadron, Westley, morning of 14 July 1940 (again)

After the CTD that ended the last mission, I'm forced to start the day afresh. The objective is similar - intercept a raid not far to the south - but this time, the skies have clouded over a little

The last few days, I seem to have got into the habit of taking off last.

We're soon swinging around to the south. Our eight Spitfires aren't the only aircraft in the vicinity. Therer are some Bogies a few miles away, but I ignore then as they are drifting further away and clearly aren't our target. In fact, they're Hurricanes, flying off to the west, evidently with a different task.

We climb in formation on our assigned vector.

...and after warping half-way, end up levelled off at about nineteen thousand. Artillery fire is bursting somewhere below.

Our formation is straggling a bit but I press on. Our target is now just five miles out and slightly right of our vector.

Soon, boys, soon!

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

There they are! Just where we were expecting them, thanks to the wonders of...whatever it is, all very hush-hush.

I order the new arrivals attacked, and begin to spiral down after them myself. At this point, more Bogies show up, to the left. And I realise the aircraft behind us aren't straggling spitfires, but more Bogies.

In fact they're all Bandits, it seems. Heinkels...

...some Messerschmitt 110s, on a sweep...

...and our own targets, these Junkers 88s, who appear to have split up to bomb ground targets nearby, in support of the enemy's bridgehead.

By this time, we're fully committed against the Ju88s, and I'm determined to spoil their day, while giving our own hard-pressed troops something to cheer about.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

By the time I'm down amongst the Ju88s, they're all over the shop...

...and the first Hun I chase after turns out to be the target of two other Spitfires.

But there are more where he came from...

...and I'm soon swooping onto another Hun, firing as the range winds down.

I get some hits and leave the bomber trailing fine smoke of vapour. I break up and away, wincing as I hear the rattle from a short burst of return fire.

I get away with it this time. The Hun isn't going to be so lucky, if I have anything to do with it.

...to be continued!

 

[33lima]

I'm soon closing fast on the damaged bomber.

He starts dodging when I start shooting. But manoeuvring hard at low level in a damaged crate can be dangerous. Suddenly, the Hun spins out...

...and that's the end of him.

Let's see if I can make it two!

...to be continued!