That’s understandable. About half the campaign focusses on CAS and air-to-ground. If you can do some auto-bombing and strafing you’ll be mostly fine for that part, and the campaign doesn’t expect GBU-12 levels of accuracy from you. The later half is focussed on air-to-air but these are oftentimes big furballs where its more important to stay alive yourself than it is to get many kills. I personally kept my speed high, Boom & zoomed through the pack trying to pick off a MiG and made sure my 6 was clear. With some practice, the Sabre is a great shooter. The gyro-sight combined with the automatic radar ranging can be very accurate. It can only sometimes be a bit frustrating how little damage the .50 cals do from time to time.
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I had two or three rides on “hunters over the Yalu” where I bagged five or six MIGs. Like the man said, get close. Short burst. Let him go if he’s calling uncle. He’ll punch out soon enough.
It’s not like you need to confirm your kills by firing until it fireballs or major bits come off .
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but, but… fireballs!!! How can you say no to a good fireball?
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Nothing wrong with a good fireball, but I rather shoot three MiG’s leaving them to limp away and having to eject over progressive engine damage than one spectacular fireball.
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The Big Show continues. Missions 2 & 3 today, a fighter sweep and an escort. Screens from VR.
Finally got my first kill of the campaign. Two in fact. We were in a huge furball and I saw a fellow who had lost his enthusiasm and was wondering off to the east. Chased him with my wingman for what felt like 10 mins, then dropped him with just a couple of cannon bursts. Victory yes, but one couldn’t help feeling vulnerable so far west and away from the group. Returning to the malaise, we passed a number of enemy, no doubt low on fuel and not paying us much attention. We made it back about the time things were breaking up and turned to intercept the bombers, now heading back to England, their eggs already dropped. Picked up the rest of our flight on the way, and happened upon a couple of Antons heading in the same direction. I bagged one, Rene the other. Was a good day.
We found a straggler and expected the worst, but saw no holes and were happy to see four props turning. Still, he must have had some damage since he was lagging so far behind the others. We remained with him until he was feet dry.
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Have you read the book by Pierre Clostermann? I 'spect you have, but if not, it’s really essential reading to get a good feel for How It Was.
Pretty sure iirc it covers pretty much the whole war in the air from BoB to VE Day.
Clostermanns recollections in his letters to his parents, and in his book, doesn’t always correspond with the mission reports though… 
Yes, read once and had the pleasure of listening to the excellently produced audio book twice. The book is handy, as you can read the chapters associated with the missions.
Reflected includes a fair amount of historical notes in the mission PDFs, which is perhaps the best part of his first attempt at commercial campaign building. If you compare The Big Show with something more recent, like Paradise Lost or Speed and Angels, one can see that his campaign building skills, and most likely available resources, increased greatly over the years. He is also to be commended at how he has retroactively improved some of his original campaigns by adding the Channel Map where applicable or reprogramming AAA when those updates came from ED. I really look forward to his Mossie campaign.
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Memories rarely do - but that doesn’t matter, really. I didn’t expect 100% accuracy - just the experience
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Le Grand Cirque is a great book of war stories.
But it was written only a few years after WWII and is supposedly based on his letters home.
It was also written in a time when France needed heroes and he himself had political ambitions. So I’m not sure his memory can be blamed…
From what I’ve read some of it is true and the rest is also true, but not necessarily experienced by Clostermann personally.
The high altitude engagement over Scapa Flow, for instance. Apparently Clostermanns part was picking one of the pilots up, after the mission, in a Tiger Moth.
But he’s not the only one to embellish a little here and there.
And, the book is a great read, no matter who did what.
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I seem to remember I bought a second book by him as well. IIRC it was a collection of stories of other pilots. Pretty sure I didn’t make it through the book or even that far in, but I can’t remember why - have to dig it out and have a look. It’s called “Flames In The Sky”. Might have simply been a translation thing - I’ve had a few of those with Kindle.
I have a fiction-based-on-fact book that I have enjoyed a couple of times, too. It’s by James Holland - I’ve read a few of his - and is about a young man being called upon to fly in the BoB. Though fiction, it’s a good read. There are two such books, in a “Duty Calls” mini-series. The other one is about the battle of France and the Dunkirk evacuation. I also read his Jack Tanner series of fictional WWII books - weren’t overly convincing imho, but quite entertaining nonetheless.
I just bought “617 - Going To War With The Dambusters”, about the tornadoes of that sqn in Op Herrick, and “Spitfire!” by Brian Lane. Not started those, yet, as I’m still reading Valentino Rossi’s biography 
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I can also recommend ‘First Light’ by Geoffrey Wellum.
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Mission number 8, off to bomb a v rocket site. (fun knowing other mudspikers are playing this campaign as well!)
Only up to 10k on this hop so my kind of climbing. Had us pointed in the right direction but ended up off course, I’m guessing I should blame the wind? Usually I sneak many, many peeks at the kneeboard using the map marker trick but tried to hold off for a while on this one; showed me.
Some shots of Detling
Crossing the channel
Here’s me and what I would like to think is my bomb (but in truth have no idea)
Sneaking a peek behind
A fireball, always nice to see
On the way home, listening to some tunes courtesy of the bbc.
This was just some neat detail I saw while external viewing around on the way home.
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Love these. It’s like watching a serial!
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Thanks! That last one was actually mission #8, fixed up the mistake. Gonna be bummed when this one is over!
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Mission 9 of the Big Show (abbreviated).
Bomber escort duty, meeting up with the B-17s at 22,000 over the water, shortly before their run-in. Glad to be flight lead now as it’s someone else’s job to try and keep up with me and my ham handed attempts at climbing.
Start up
ATC sends us out on runway 23, friendly wave to my wingman as I taxi out
Oh, that runway 23.
I nearly jumped out of my chair, things had gone so normally for a while I forgot how spectacularly you could screw up when not paying attention at take off!
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Second try went better, pretty intense mission. Despite the warnings on channel C it felt like the enemy came out of nowhere to hit the bombers.
Here we are on top cover (probably too high but that flak did not look inviting)
They started with a head on pass, was frightening and impressive to see
I spotted two enemy that didn’t seem to be mixing it up with the bombers, thought I’d better go after them before they started diving down to pick off our fighters . Got in a few hits on one but then the tables were promptly turned.
My nemesis behind, trailing vapor of some kind
Reverse angle, my wingman gallantly attempting a rescue
Running for home, I think this guy took the shooting business personally cause he followed me way longer than I expected.
Finally alone, the plane was barely controllable but I decided to call it a ‘win’ when I was able to limp half way across the channel.
Had a look around with F2 and thought ‘at least I’m not that guy’
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I love those sorties where you have to nurse a wounded plane a long way back home, regardless of sim!
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The added challenge of successfully landing on a carrier is the only thing that makes it any more satisfying.
Wheels
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I loved that in IL-2 Pacific… Finding the carrier group in the middle of the ocean, and then cram the thing down on the deck.
Incredibly satisfying.
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