New ideas for "Historic missions" in Sim?

[Mage_016]

First of all i'm sorry if I was interrupting the game you had. I knew what was going on, but I wasn't sure that did you have chosen your planes and teams earlier.

At the first try I was shot down couple of times before I even made to the hawkings airfield. I was little frustrated and left that match. For the next one, I was in the lobby and after a while I saw the room was full and some guys with mic was not in so I decided to leave and left room for them.

It's good idea to preorganise the game here in forum and then meet in textchat before the lobby is made. Then reorganise if someone is not showing up. I personally don't think any penalties are good thing, because this eventually is only a videogame and it should be more fun than anything else. Different thing is in tournaments, there some penalties are must.
And for using map, I had to check where the hell is that hawkings airfield

[MACADEMIC]

Hi Mage,

Sorry if I misrepresented you in my post. I also don't think that you were the problem.

About penalties, okay perhaps it's taking it too far, but I still think scheduled events are a good idea.

How about this: for each historic mission a thread is created. If this mission proves popular, we can ask the moderators to make it a sticky. On this thread we ask community members who would like to play this game to give a statement that they have read and understood the mission and have done all necessary training and familiarisation to make themselves proficient for the mission. The thread starter can then keep the list of eligible players up to date in the first posting of his thread.

This way missions could be started either scheduled or even spontaneously, if enough qualified players are online. It would also create a pool of qualified players who could fill in when someone cannot attend. Again, I would recommend to start from text chat.

So long,

MAC

[McQ59]

No worries Mage. You weren't even close to be the problem last saturday night. Your neighbour in east was the loose cannon and caused us some delays there.

I totally go for the compromises Zhang suggests in the post above, and the suggestions from both Mage and MAC on how to organize the next mission(s).

I have tried to do some thinking on how to improve the conditions for the missions that involves bombers, and how to do it a bit more interesting for the bomberguys. It seemed that the fighters involved in the Battle of Britain were more or less uninterested in attacking the bombers - and intercepted the 109's instead. What if we put up a mission on one of the maps that involves ships; Britain or Sicily, and the task is of course for the bombers to damage/sink the ship(s). If we put limits on wich bombers to use (not the Arado or the B-17. They inflict to much damage to fast) it might be possible to have a progress in the mission that makes it fun for everyone involved. The 3-4 bombers task is a mentioned to bomb the ships, they got top-cover from 3-4 fighters and will be intercepted by 6-8 enemy fighters.

The goal is not to win by tickets, but to improve skills and have fun trying to do the job. And of course to be the last bird flying... and return to base.

If you guys think this is a mission you could take part in, I'll establish a thread for it - and schedule the time and map, and try to organize it for the upcoming saturday due to the suggestions that has come up to improve the feasibility.

Suggested allied bombers: A20 or Blenheims
Suggested german bombers: He-111 or Stukas

German fighters: G-2 or F-4, 190's. I guess the italian 202's can be used too (by the real highrisktakers).
Allied fighters: Hurricanes, Mk. IX and Mustangs.

These should be regarded only as suggestions. I'm very open to other ideas to improve and increase the fun-factor!

[RuffMonk]

Well I'm about to kick off a historical series with some of the late night arcade crowd that will span 14 different scenarios covering the Battle of Britain from its outbreak up to the nighttime bombing raids of London. I did some research and found the Battle of Britain Historical Society's website that has actual historical breakdowns for each day that detailed aircraft involved, times of day even down to the weather. So check out the link below it was a MAJOR help for my campaign.

http://www.battleofbritain1940.net/contents-index.html

I'm currently looking to cover the Russian invasion from Operation Barbarossa onwards and my research so far hasn't come up with anything other than general info regarding aerial engagements, so if anyone has any resources detailing specific information, I'd REALLY appreciate it.

[MACADEMIC]

Originally Posted by RuffMonk

Well I'm about to kick off a historical series with some of the late night arcade crowd that will span 14 different scenarios covering the Battle of Britain from its outbreak up to the nighttime bombing raids of London. I did some research and found the Battle of Britain Historical Society's website that has actual historical breakdowns for each day that detailed aircraft involved, times of day even down to the weather. So check out the link below it was a MAJOR help for my campaign.

http://www.battleofbritain1940.net/contents-index.html

I'm currently looking to cover the Russian invasion from Operation Barbarossa onwards and my research so far hasn't come up with anything other than general info regarding aerial engagements, so if anyone has any resources detailing specific information, I'd REALLY appreciate it.

Sources would most likely be in German or Russian. With German I can help you translating!

Would love to see the missions you have worked out, although I'm playing in simulator. But if you don't mind we could exchange ideas and missions and modify as required.

MAC

[RuffMonk]

Sounds like a plan! I basically looked through all the battles listed in the website and picked out the most significant battle for each week spanning the first three phases of the battle with one or two having two battles picked out. I then just basically tried to mirror that particular engagement as close as I could. I tried to make the aircraft as proportionally close to the real thing as possible. For example:

Our first battle will be the first engagement on July 10th where 24 Do-17s, 30 Bf-110s and 20+ Bf-109s crossed the Channel and attacked. In game, it will be a Strike mission on the Britain map with 2 He-111s (in place of the Do-17s), 3 Bf-110s and 2 Bf-109s going head to head with 4 Hurricanes and 2 Spitfires (the listed squadrons that engaged the Luftwaffe in that battle). It will be a daytime attack b/c it's listed on the website as 1350 during the rain as the weather called for rain that day according to the site. I even asked the top aces in arcade to fly for the Luftwaffe as a way to somewhat level the skill differences and b/c the Luftwaffe had the better pilots historically.

Another mission I have set is at the outset of phase 2. There was a communication mix up where the first assault was called off and in one particular case only the escorts of Oberst Johannes Fink's bomber group got the message. The Do-17s went on and ultimately had no fighter escort. So one of our missions will mirror this SNAFU where 9 He-111s will tangle with 4 fighters. On the opposite side we'll be doing the same with Blenheims and 109s to recreate Britain's first nighttime bombing raid of Berlin. These are perhaps the ones I'm looking forward to the most as they just scream "Red Skies Over Dover" in the single campaign (one of my favorites). None of these are meant to be competitive and is more for the experience then anything else.

So nothing special on my part here, but I do have some surprises in store for the the RAF guys once phase 2 of the Battle of Britain battles begin that I will pm you about in case some of them visit the site. I don't want to spoil anything, lol!

Anyway, feel free to pick my brain as I will help you as much as I can. I'm also open to suggestions as this will the first time I've organized anything like this and so I'm just making it up as I go along, lmao!!!

[vdomini]

Hello guys!

I've tryed historical mission with mac last weekend was so fun and cool!

hope to do it again!!


have fun!

[McQ59]

I'm working on an idea to launch "Operation Husky" - the invasion of Sicily.

The mission on Canterbury last saturday l think learned us that to get the bombers to be at bit more central in the battle, I want to engage ships as targets and do it in strike-mode. This way the fighters are given an incitament to down them before they get to do theire bombruns.

The general idea is to set it to 1943 and have the german side to scramble He-111 and Stukas at the airfield at Catania. The top-cover will be G2's and F4's, and maybe a cpl of 202's from the Italian airforce.

The allied forces will defend the ships with the aid of P51's and Spits. The thought strategy will be for the mustangs to engage enemy fighters, and the spits to engage enemy bombers.

What do you guys think? Anyone interested in doing a mission like that? If it is, I'll put up a thread with the name "Operation Husky" and follow MACs idea of how to brief it from there...

[Gilly]

I'm in mate. Happy to fly anything.
Regarding the mission briefing I did create one for the one on Saturday in the historic group it's just no one bothered with it obviously (save for those who pre-committed to an aircraft). What Saturday did demonstrate is how lacking sadly BoP is in terms of it's lobbys compared to other titles. Whilst we all know about the necessary 'work arounds' in certain areas of this game, having stubborn 'I'm not leaving, I'm flying an airborne T34 and I'll do my best to spoil it for all' types really wound me up. Having been graced with recent titles whereby idiots are quickly removed and even 'reported' for being idiots it really is one thing that needs to be addressed in any possible sequel.
As much as I really think these historics are a great idea I get the horrible feeling that the pre-lobby (for example using sicily 1943) will end up with B17 and IL's which will either require much messaging to those without headsets or common sense and subsequent frustration for those having to wait. Whilst I agree with the pre-match chat room should cut down on this we saw Saturday how quickly lobby's get 'hijacked'. Sorry not meant to be a downer but having laid out a brief that those who had read it understood it just wound me on Saturday night having to sit until the lobby was correct and then having to deal once in the game with the randoms. I want to play this game for the fun factor and not to have to babysit stubborn morons.

[McQ59]

No problem in seeing what you mean Gilly. If we get a good pre-interesst for doing the "Op Husky" on saturday, the mission will be launched from the text-chat. The number of players in the chat will be the # of players in the lobby. It will be pointed out that no B-17's or Arados or IL's will be given permission to take off.

Let's see if we can do it. It has been done before.