The Forgotten Battles

[Tovarish 0]

Life is brutal and often short for a pilot in the VVS these days, as I have seen from my first combat mission after joining the 3rd Iak VVS in Smolensk, on July 1st, 1941. Our aircraft seem inadequate; We are equipped with model 18 I-16's, which have no cannon armament, yet today we were tasked with achieving air supperiority over Zaromovo. It was an impossible goal given the circumnstances. Our flight of 5 I-16's met with a large number of Emils. I did not count exactly how many, for soon I was fighting for my life. The facist planes were able to control the pace of the fight - with their superior speed and climbing ability they could engage and disengage at will. Soon the radio was filled with the cries of my comerades who were being slaughtered.

I managed to get a good shot at the Emil that was attacking our flight leader, Podpolkovnik Konishov. After a 2 second burst of fire, his engine started streaming a thin line of smoke, and I knew that this plane would not be making it back to his base. He broke off his attack and I followed him to finish him off, but somehow he managed to turn more tightly than I, and dove for the deck.

Even with a damaged engine he managed to widen the distance between us, and after a minute or so I broke off the pursuit, deciding instead to try to make sure another German plane would not return to base.

I soon found that it was indeed lucky that I turned away, because close behind me was another Emil. We began to dance. The pilot was obviously very good, he kept his maneuvers to the vertical, where he had the advantage, and i was forced to parry his attacks while climbing slowly after him in a spiral, waiting for the moment he may make a mistake. That moment came no sooner than 15 minutes later - he followed up one of his diving attacks on me with a hard turn my I-16 was able to match, and when he tried to climb again, I was confident that I would have enough energy to follow him, and I was able to put him in my sights at close range.

I let off a 5 second burst, and I saw his engine begin to smoke as well as a fuel leak. He stopped maneuvering, and I saw his canopy come off. Then suddenly I noticed something odd about the sound of my engine, and realized that I too had made a grave mistake - I was stalling, and the negative G forces had starved my engine of fuel. I cursed the lousy design of the careburator on the I-16, and guided my aircraft East, towards friendly territory. Luckily my fight with the Emil had brought me up to 4000 meters. I landed safey in a field, frantically working the landing gear crank at the last possible moment. Soon there after friendly troops found me, and recovered my aircraft.

Back at base I learned that i was one of only two pilots from my flight to come out alive.

Podpolkovnik Konishov, Lietnant Borisov, and Lietnant Gusenko had all perished. Kapitan Paskakov had been somewhat luckier and was recovering in hospital. We had lost 6 aircraft in the furball - two other friendly aircraft must have joined the fight, alas, to no avail - and the enemy had lost 3. I also learned that a German ace, Graf von Kageneck, had been in one of those 3 planes, and had bailed out safely. My eyes widened for a moment - could it be true that on my first combat sortie I had bested one of the enemy's finest pilots? But this feeling was overshadowed by the sadness of loosing so many comerades in such a short time.

[Tex -USMC- 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Aaron Kane @ Mar. 10 2003,05:32)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Holy crap Tex, I know!  Those damned I16's are everywhere!  At least 1/2 of my kill list were those little stubby bastards!<span id='postcolor'>

well, at least with the 190 you have some serious cannon armament that will tear them up- with an Emil or a Frederick it takes luck to bring an I-16 down on the first pass, no matter how well you place your rounds. Anyways, back to the grind; I'm pretty sure that after a month or so of this my staffel will be heading to Stalingrad with the rest of Luftflotte 4

[dayglow 2]

Damn I've fallen in love with the 190 . I'm still with IL2 and playing through the Barbarossa campaign. I've just upgraded from a 109F4, which is a very nice plane to a 190. I just did an intercept mission against some transports. Dived down hard and was at 550km/hr and got one lined up in my sites. At .2 I opened up and the transport disintergrated With the F4 it would have been dive attack, dive attack a few times and smoke the engine. Wow, I'm in love.

COLINMAN

[Tex -USMC- 0]

The trade off is that the 190 turns just a little tighter than a battleship- not so bad if you get your BnZ down, but otherwise... well, you know.

PS- the ShKas machine guns are pissing me off man. I get these piddly little mg17s that couldn't bring down a pigeon, and they get these ShKas's that seem to have infinite ammo and can saw your wing off like nothing else.

[dayglow 2]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tex [uSMC] @ Mar. 10 2003,00:16)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">The trade off is that the 190 turns just a little tighter than a battleship- not so bad if you get your BnZ down, but otherwise... well, you know.

PS- the ShKas machine guns are pissing me off man. I get these piddly little mg17s that couldn't bring down a pigeon, and they get these ShKas's that seem to have infinite ammo and can saw your wing off like nothing else.<span id='postcolor'>

Could you please tell the AI that, I'm tired of them barrel rolling around me at will when I fly the P39

COLINMAN

[Tex -USMC- 0]

Still don't know how they do that

[Tovarish 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tex [uSMC] @ Mar. 10 2003,08:16)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">PS- the ShKas machine guns are pissing me off man. I get these piddly little mg17s that couldn't bring down a pigeon, and they get these ShKas's that seem to have infinite ammo and can saw your wing off like nothing else.<span id='postcolor'>

Hey man, stop complaining . At least you don't have to nervously watch the RPM gauge every time you maneuver. Having an engine that can't take negative G's AND can't be restarted from the air is a very bad thing! As i mentioned in my account of my first mission, you definitely do not want to follow a 109 into a climb in an I-16, and those 109 AI's know how to Boom and Zoom now, and to watch each others tails. It really looks like I'll have to work hard on just surviving until my squadron's re-equipped with better aircraft, and some squadrons flew I-16's until 1943, so I don't think that'll happen anytime soon . Oh well, even a model 24 I-16 with cannons would be an improvement. We're loosing aircraft and pilots like crazy as well, in our second mission, 8 of us ran into 8 Me-110's. We shot down all of them, and lost 4 aircraft - all 4 pilots as well. I bagged 2 of the 110's myself and was promoted to Lietnant, and awarded the Order of the Red Banner. We only have 9 aircraft left.

I'm also playing without the speedbar, so I have to look down at my gagues quite often. I've found that using the onboard compass is a real pain in the ass. Not only does the joystick block it from view, but it dosen't give accurate readings unless you're fliying straight and level.

[Col. Kurtz 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tovarish @ Mar. 11 2003,01:17)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I'm also playing without the speedbar, so I have to look down at my gagues quite often. I've found that using the onboard compass is a real pain in the ass. Not only does the joystick block it from view, but it dosen't give accurate readings unless you're fliying straight and level.<span id='postcolor'>

In order to play FB more realisticly, Tovarish thought it necercary to shoot himself in the foot

[Tovarish 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Col. Kurtz @ Mar. 10 2003,21:22)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">In order to play FB more realisticly, Tovarish thought it necercary to shoot himself in the foot <span id='postcolor'>

LOL. It's a bit more of a challenge, but hey, I'm getting kills, I'm not flying into the ground, after familiarizing myself with the cockpit I can use all the gagues effectively - airspeed and altitude on the I-16 are at the very top so I don't really have to look down even if I'm not in wide cockpit view. Plus, being able to read Russian is an advantage in the Soviet planes

*edit* Besides, trust me, if you fly an I-16 or an I-153 under realistic settings, you're going to want to get used to looking at your instruments a lot...You're going to have to get very familiar with your RPM gague for sure.

[Aaron Kane 0]

Just for the record, I'm currently flying my campaign under normal difficulty, thus making me less of a man

[Tex -USMC- 0]

The only thing I have turned off is the Complex Engine Management- I don't need that kind of insanity lol. Besides, I don't think I have enough room on my keyboard to bind everything properly. As for the speed bar, I use it to simulate the ability to glance down and back up without having to take my hand off the flight stick to use the mouse.

[Tovarish 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tex [uSMC] @ Mar. 10 2003,22:56)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">The only thing I have turned off is the Complex Engine Management- I don't need that kind of insanity lol. Besides, I don't think I have enough room on my keyboard to bind everything properly. As for the speed bar, I use it to simulate the ability to glance down and back up without having to take my hand off the flight stick to use the mouse.<span id='postcolor'>

*smacks Tex upside the head* What the?! Dude! in German planes, engine management is automatic!!

[Aaron Kane 0]

Alright, is it possible in FB to be damaged so that your stick input is really jerky? Like I'll press all the way forward on the stick, and my nose starts to dive, then pops up, then goes down, and sometimes just refuses to go down at all. I didnt get that "XXX has been damaged" message however...

I noticed this happening after some asshole Yak7 decided to strafe my 6 o'clock, and was just wondering if you all have had something similar happen. It might just be my new stick...

[Tovarish 0]

Same happened to me in my I-16. I looked and my elevator was shot up

[Tex -USMC- 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tovarish @ Mar. 10 2003,23:42)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tex [uSMC] @ Mar. 10 2003,22:56)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">The only thing I have turned off is the Complex Engine Management- I don't need that kind of insanity lol. Besides, I don't think I have enough room on my keyboard to bind everything properly. As for the speed bar, I use it to simulate the ability to glance down and back up without having to take my hand off the flight stick to use the mouse.<span id='postcolor'>

*smacks Tex upside the head* What the?! Dude! in German planes, engine management is automatic!!  <span id='postcolor'>

Not in the Emil

[dayglow 2]

Well, I'm back from my volunteer job at the mall, so I have a shiny box with FB in it. After dinner it's going to be installed and maybe in a week or two I'll drag this thread back up

COLINMAN

[Tovarish 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Tex [uSMC] @ Mar. 11 2003,01:53)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Not in the Emil  <span id='postcolor'>

Oh, my bad . Engine management's not so bad really. Now the shitty engine in the I-16, that's another matter. Twice now I've had to make an emergency landing in a field after pulling some maneuvers my plane didn't like. Luckily, both times have been behind friendly territory. I've made 10 sorties now, and have been credited with 8 kills ( made a few more actually, but they don't count if they manage to ditch ). I have been awarded the Order of the Red Star and the Order of the Red Banner

Half of the ones i've been credited with are 109's and half 110's. Two of the one 109's I finished off by ramming their tail with my propeller - a very delicate move I only attempted once they were heavily damaged and flying slow and straight. I tried saving a quick track of the second one I rammed but it got corrupted somehow . Oh well, next mission perhaps. The germans have us on the run - we've had to move to a different airfield 3 times now, and every mission we take heavy losses. At this point I'm just trying to survive until I can get a better aircraft.

Oh and:

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Alright, is it possible in FB to be damaged so that your stick input is really jerky? Like I'll press all the way forward on the stick, and my nose starts to dive, then pops up, then goes down, and sometimes just refuses to go down at all. I didnt get that "XXX has been damaged" message however...

<span id='postcolor'>

I noticed this happen on a few other occasions, even when I hadn't been shot at. Always at low level. Looks like FB models turbulence

[//relic// 0]

It does model turbulence, look in the difficulty options page.

I personally don't like it, I think it's boring & tedious  I'd trade my left nut to see F4 ported to the IL-2 engine though, the environmental graphics are *lush*  

Can anyone explain to me why most of the keys are unbound by default?

[Tex -USMC- 0]

It does indeed model turbulence. Try dogfighting during a rainstorm now- there are patches of turbulence all over the place that can really mess up your sight picture. I got 4 I-16s during a rainstorm in my DC, and should've been credited with a U2 biplane- I mean, if you sheer your starboard wing off just to prevent a reconnaisance aircraft from making it home, you gotta at least get a little love.

Incidentally- 52 kills as of May 14, 1942, and that's Oberstleutnant Sullivan to you (I know it's not a German name, but work with me here lol)

[Tex -USMC- 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I personally don't like it, I think it's boring & tedious I'd trade my left nut to see F4 ported to the IL-2 engine though, the environmental graphics are *lush*

<span id='postcolor'>

this is air combat- F4 is like nintendo at mach speeds.

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote </td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Can anyone explain to me why most of the keys are unbound by default?

<span id='postcolor'>

Because if they bound them all you wouldn't have any space left on your keyboard. Also, the way Il-2 works is that you can load different keysets just by changing your pilot, so you can have a bomber pilot with a setup for a bomber aircraft, a fighter aircraft, and an obsolete biplane setup too if you so desire

[Hit_Sqd_Maximus 0]

Can you fly with a joystick? My joystick is broken and I dont want to use a keyboard to fly with

[Tex -USMC- 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Hit_Sqd_Maximus @ Mar. 11 2003,05:28)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Can you fly with a joystick? My joystick is broken and I dont want to use a keyboard to fly with  <span id='postcolor'>

huh?

[Col. Kurtz 0]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Hit_Sqd_Maximus @ Mar. 11 2003,13:28)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Can you fly with a joystick? My joystick is broken and I dont want to use a keyboard to fly with  <span id='postcolor'>

Wouldn't recomend it. As you might have seen from this thread, up until recently I didn't have a half decent joystick so I flew with the keyboard and its quite hard. Its fine for just flying around and its fine for fighting if you have all the realism turned off, but put on realism and it becomes real hard to fight other planes.

This is from my experiance with IL-2 however so maybe its totally diffrent for FB, but I doubt it.

[Tex -USMC- 0]

weeeeeeeee

I just scored five victories in one sortie! Which, considering how lightly armed the Frederick is, is no easy feat. Of course, 4 were Mig-3s...

[dayglow 2]

OMFG, it's amazing Love it. That perfect terrain his hammering my system, so I'm concidering dialing back a bit, but man o man the ai upgrade is enough, plus the campaign system. All good

COLINMAN