Well, there are several philosophies throughout us players. I've been playing OFF since it came out, flight simulators since 1980's and a private pilot in real life. There are many of us like this. I'm also what one might call a 'purist' so take what I suggest with a grain of salt.
The best way to enjoy the immersion of this sim is to fly campaign.
You don't need to start in 1915, just whenever suits your interests.
First of all, I suggest the same attitude to use if you fly model airplanes. Don't do it unless you're prepared to crash. You will lose pilots; either through enemy action, AA fire or your own mistakes. The goal in OFF is to survive 17 hours flight time. You'll soon discover why.
Flying: I fly with all aids off. No tac display, no labels, no map. I use paper maps and landmarks, roads and railroads to navigate by. I do have buttons on my joystick to turn the tac and labesl on and off, strictly so I can find particular ground targets when the mission calls for it. I use my Mark I eyeballs to search for other planes. Some allow themselves to use the aids because the monitor resolution cannot adequately display small, distant targets. It is exciting to see three brown shapes zipping across the lines a few thousand feet below you and deciding whether to dive on them not knowing who they are. For the best immersion, you should have joystick, throttle, rudder pedals and TrackIr. Once you have these in flight simulator, you'll never settle for anything less. I also never use warp or autopilot and fly the full mission manually. If I don't have time to do so, I don't play or fly a quick combat mission.
Game: Your computer must dictate how much detail you can specify and still get acceptable frame rates. The higher the numbers, the more you'll get, but the harder your machine has to work. There's also some speculation that the higher your numbers, the better the AI behaves. There are some spectacular sceney and effects to behold as you fly over France. Artillery barrages, red poppy fields, highly detailed steam engines, etc. The forests and mountains in the Vosges are beautiful.
Missions: OFF doesn't keep track of whether you hit the waypoints, or complete the mission objectives. As in real life, you're up there, you decide what to do balancing your survival versus the importance of the mission and the lives of your comerades. Whether and how you fulfill your mission objectives is up to you and you have to live with yourself. So, completing your objective to the best of your ability and returning home is your job. Most of us set death on die roll in the workshop as dead is dead gives you no chance of surviving even the weakest crash due to CFS3 yet obviously unsurvivable events do kill you. Also, if you go down behind enemy lines OFF doesn't know this and so you're back for the next mission. For my part, if my pilot goes down behing enemy lines, he's captured. This is remedied in P3 BTW. How you handle it is up to you. I also use the gun jam utility to keep the frustation level higher.
The immersion in this sim is incredible. The scenery, all going on around you, the tedium, the terror, the thrill, all pull you in. I vivdly remember a balloon busting mission where I looked back to check the position of my wingman just as an AA burst caught him square in the middle and he fell apart and went down. I genuinely was shocked and saddened. As in real life, one instant he was there, the next, he was gone. If you let it, this sim will pull you as close to the experience as you can get. It still has some limitation from the CFS3 engine, but P3 has almost all of that taken care of. Also, you'll find, as in real life, as you accumulate flight hours, your skill increases. I mean yours, not your pilot's. Your reactions will get better, your aircraft handling, your spotting ability, your gunnery, all of it. Also, if you fly in an area long enough, you'll get to know it as well, the names of the towns, the landmarks, just as if you flew over where you live. Some missions may find you actually, landing, shutting off your engine and finding yourself in a sweat.
There was a myriad of useful information on the forum, I could point you to, but it's gone now, so it'll have to accumulate again, but the fellows here are superb, knowledgeable and friendly. Except Gimpy, but he is helpful. You'll learn things as you go and what suits your tastes best. No one here will seriously deride you if you want to use warp or keep labels on, etc. Whatever gives you the most enjoyment from OFF is most important. And remember, as good as P2 is, P3 purports to be even so much better. If you want to know more, just ask. At least you can't be jumped on now, for not having read the stickies or searched the forum.:ernae:
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