Looking at that pic, Cowboy 1-1 is not quietly moseying off into that yonder evenin. That hombre is fangs out going full blower like that!
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The Big Show number six; started out promising with a low level (no climbing!) escort but ended with me letting Pierre down big time with my first campaign death.
Our charges (P-51s standing in for Typhoons)
Some scenes of battle
I had been so good about checking six in these missions, but here’s the moment when I lapsed
that’s me getting smushed into the dirt
I followed them around and felt better upon seeing his comeuppance
Squadron mate getting picked off on the way home
Looked like most of the bombers made it back, which is something I guess
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Regarding the Spit that’s an inverted inferno, it had me saying, “Get out man!” Deep breath, loosen the straps, open the hood, and roll!
I flew Big Show mission 1 today. I will say that I was asleep when the gaggle began climbing, so was 2900 and +13 all the way to TOC, which is where I caught them. Temps were not too bad, but I wished that I would have throttled back sooner, to have a little more cooling time between climb and combat.
The Huns didn’t dally, and not long after going feet dry, we were jumped by a mass of angry birds from above. I worked my way on the tail of an Anton, but right as I saddled up, one of his fellow countryman sent a few shots passed my cockpit, causing a hard break to port. Surprisingly, I acquired the procrastinator in short order, which probably goes hand-in-hand with his marksmanship. But then their leader ducked them into the soup. Not a shot fired from me.
I remained on top, my modus operandi, but the fight seemed to be content to frolic among the clouds. I could hear machineguns rattling, cannon booming, and engines groaning, all under a pillow of white, but no aircraft emerged. After a while, as I pondered continuing on the RV heading, the blighters pinged my kite from below. I swear they can see with x-ray vision! That caused me to do what I swore I would never, blindly dive into the muck, now thicker than I expected. Mental note to take better back-of-hand notes during the weather briefing.
I cursed myself when I popped out of the crud, spotting a pair of Jerries at my 4 o’clock. I called for help, but the only friendly nearby was in a bad state and about to be the guest of either the Resistance, or one of the Luft Stalags.
My two opponents and I proceeded to drop gloves and immediately turn into each other. After a bit, I feared that they were dragging me Northwest toward their airfield or a flak battalion, but my Spit finally gained the advantage. I managed to beat one up pretty badly, driving him off limping, and keep the other one entertained until we either lost interest or ran out of BBs.
As a turned to the RTB course of 310 and began climbing, I checked the gauges. The radiator looked fine, but the oil temp was 95! Oh my, not good. I must do a better job of keeping that in the scan.
Did I mention that I hate being low over France? Nothing comes good from it other than reminding one’s self never to do it again. Too much flak, too many enemy aircraft, not enough altitude to plan an off field landing or to reach sea rescue. I was happy to RTB with an empty game bag, but with my arse still firmly attached. That deck fighting and airfield strafing is for the young guys.
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Wow, what a great tale! My resistance to jumping into DCS WW2 is faltering.
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The AI’s vision is currently not blocked by clouds so under no circumstances should you be following them if they decide to fight it out inside the clouds.
Hiding in clouds only works against other players in multiplayer.
@Deacon211 you should try it, it’s great. I have no experience with campaigns as I spend 90% of my WWII time on the 4YA Project Overlord WWII Server but it’s a fantastic experience.
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Cleaned up pretty good this afternoon. Took down two P-47s and destroyed about 10-15 ground units - trucks, halftracks and M8 Greyhounds
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What a great write up!
I know, it looked pretty gnarly in the cockpit for that poor guy. I did feel a little pang of something seeing that too.
Those clouds were almost the end of me also. I stayed up top for a bit but then impatience got the better of me and I popped on the labels. Seeing all that action in the clouds I dove in figuring it would clear up, but I was lucky to come out of it right side up and not 10 feet off (or under) the ground.
I just looked at that and it seems there may now be an issue with IC - not that I do much online in DCS these days, so I suppose it doesn’t really matter.
Anyway, I just went and looked at my screenshots and funnily enough I have 3 different types and have no idea why they are different. All were using SteamVR - first is Pico 4, then Index, then Quest 2. Pico and Quest with Virtual Desktop wireless.
Oh - and apart from AA I always use highest textures and also use shadows (not flat in 2.8 as I read they are worse now). I also get far better cockpit graphics in both FS and IL-2, complete with nice shadows.
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Thanks. Had not heard about the IC issue, but good to know. I can toggle it off in a second with OvGME. It worked with my G2, Quest 2, and now the Quest Pro, so thinking that it’s global, no matter the runtime.
I just read about the IC thing - maybe it’s not a factor any more. I’m just baffled why the Index shot doesn’t have any mask.
It’s difficult to decide which headset to wear these days. The Quest 2 is comfy now that I have a good 3rd party strap for it. The Index is better graphics imo - especially for scenery, though the instruments are slightly clearer in Quest 2 due to the lower SDE factor.
The Pico 4 has easily the best graphics and lenses (though the image lacks a bit of saturation afaict) but isn’t very comfy for me. I bought the only 3rd party face pad & interface I could find - a Chinese special being sold by a billion ebay sellers - but it turned out worse than the OEM one. It does increase your FOV by being thinner than the OEM ‘gasket’ but it’s so close to my face that the edges of the lenses press against my face, which isn’t nice, and I get eye aches after about half an hour, which I don’t get with the OEM one.
I didn’t get a G2 because I never wanted to have to mess with WMR and tbh I was happy with my Index for tethered VR.
Decisions, decisions… 
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You can rest assured It’s not an IC issue. At least I haven’t come across any problems in Multiplayer so far. Last flight was last night so pretty recent 
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Mission number 7 from the big show. The title ‘tussle in the stratosphere’ was my first clue that climbing, always my favorite activity, would be featured heavily but luckily it didn’t go too poorly.
Getting better at it, but everything still gets real wobbly for me me once I hit the 20’s. I think I still don’t have the hang of when to start increasing throttle, everything will seem fine then all of a sudden I’m flopping around in the thin air practically standing still.
Winter scenery was a nice change of pace, unfortunately meant the engine conking out for me 3 times on take off before I realized it would probably be a good idea to warm it up!
Doing my best to ‘buster to angels 40’
Actually made it to the location, and whatever height the snooper was at which I was pretty happy about.
Only catch was I was going about as fast as a go-cart and in no way ready for a fight, happily my wingman was more than grateful to take the lead and made short work of him.
Here’s my view while cheering him on
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I tell you, there must be something wrong with me (no gaffs, please!).
I own a number of payware campaigns for DCS, have done since the original Black Shark and the Vergeev(en) campaign - and yet I’ve not flown a single one! I always want to, but never do.
In fact, the only ‘DCS’ campaign I’ve ever flown is the freeware Revanche in the Su25 - and that was FC2, though I did complete the DCSW 1.24 version updated by Winz. I’ve done it all the way through once and most of the way several times. I think it’s more about flying what I’m comfy with tbh. Thank God my dicky right hand has no effect on my flying (well I struggle with one of the buttons on my T50, but that’s a minor thing).
I’m thinking I’d better get on and fly some. I reckon the Museum Relic might not be a bad one to do first - those aircraft are pretty basic so not too much for me to have to remember!
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I remember enjoying that campaign too, it had lots of comms, right? I think the first few had you ‘under the wing’ of a flight lead, kind of talking you through what to do?
The missions (at least the ones I remember) seemed manageable, too which isn’t always the case.
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Yep, that’s the one. It had a bit of atmosphere and made me want to continue, while presenting not just a threat, but having to work out exactly what strategy to use to accomplish the mission rather than simply blowing something up for dodging lots of SAMs. That’s probably more like real life ops, but it was nice to have to think about what priority targets were and where they were, to get a mission success.
Using wingmen properly was vital in that campaign, though in later missions they did often either put themselves in harms way unnecessarily, or just dump their stores and run.
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Museum Relic is awesome. Right up there with the most fun times I had in DCS. None too hard either.
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Museum relic is the only one that I’ve played through in full. I only did that one as i know the sabre so well. Its a great fun campaign.
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Did you try Hunters over the Yalu then? I really liked that one as well.
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I was thinking of that one - only put off by my doubts about my air to air skills with guns in jets. I do well in IL-2 with props and in space games, too, but I wasn’t so good in WWI stuff or jets either. I have done lots of reading but I still tend to run out of energy in jets and biplanes.
That is a good one, never finished it, but certainly gave me a nice Mig Alley vibe (which to this day probably the best dynamic campaign engine out there).
2 things, drag the mig down low, and enjoy the fact that DCS’s AI pretty much does this for you. A simple 1 circle fight at lower altitude will eventually get you on his tail. From there just remember 6 .50 cals are not a 20mm cannon, get close, get closer, get closer still, then don’t be afraid to dump the entire belt into him if need be.
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