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Almost There
Sgt, Rfc
2 Sqn
Flanders

10 June 1915.


By Jove a real Banger today. 4 ships left for a Recon by Lens. Reaching the Lines , I spotted and engaged 2 Hun Recon Types. I pulled in front and a little low my gunner banged away 85 Rds. The sods just hung there finally Archie opened up and they turned for home. If I only had a gun firing forward I would have had them both.


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1 point

Plinking with the .303 is fun

Another day and another artillery shoot. Leidenbrock circled around their assigned position while Kampe did his work.

As he looked around, Liedenbrock spotted two aeroplanes far below him. He watched with interest as they crossed into German territory. One machine suddenly deviated and made north. Then it came to a stop as it landed near the lines.

"Ours or theirs?" Liedenbrock wondered and decended to take a look.

It was a French monoplane that had come to rest in a quiet area that was hardly damaged by the battles of the previous autumn. Liedenbrock overflew the two airmen. This was the closest he had ever been to the enemy.

The Frenchmen just stared upwards.



Thinking this all very gentlemanly, Leidenbrock saluted them and returned south to his observation. The soldiers in the lines had no appreciation for the antics of these birdmen and shot a number of holes in the Aviatik's wings.



Duly chastised, Axel climbed away. He wondered what Steinborn would make of his wing damage.

Almost There
Sgt, Rfc
2 Sqn, Rfc

Flanders

June 11, 1915.



Dawn Recon Western most of our Operational Area. 4 a/c flown. No new trench's or bunkers observed. A supply train was spotted moving up. No aerial contact spotted.


3 a/c Arty Spot flown during the late afternoon. What a site, small and large explosions all over NML. However did notice that for a rolling barrage a lot of space was left open. Recommended that Volleys be closer together.


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points 2 ea.

Answering da questions:

CWS: 5 PM UTC is 1 PM US Eastern, or Noon US Central on Sunday. I'd consider filling out your form on Saturday if you can.

MFair: Personally for bombing missions I've been thinking that if there are any ground kills then that counts as a successful mission. If YOU get a ground kill then that's worth 1 point.

I'm assuming you made that skin.....but where did you put it????? and with which name???

danke

Yes I did.

You put the skin in the campaign/CampaignData/skins folder and the naming convention is very specific.

"Off_Aviatik_BI_ace_t_FFA 8b 1915_Axel Leidenbrock.dds" Replacing "Axel Leidenbrock" with whatever particular name you want. Note the spaces as well as underscores.

Journal Entry June 12, 1915
St. Pol-sur-Mer

Well, it's been a long and exhausting two weeks since I got to St. Pol. I believe Thayer and myself have really bonded into a fine team, though, I was really frustrated with the lad on the 10th, but I'll get to that in a bit. The rest of lads all seem to be a professional lot. We have normally been flying two sorties a day and I don't know if that's a normal schedule or not, what I do know is at the end of the day I'm very tired and I've been retiring early. I've met an interesting fellow named Alvin, rather quiet and keeps to himself in the mess. I think I'll see if I can strike up a conversation with him the next time we're together. I imagine there is quite an interesting story behind that quiet facade.

Well enough of the chit-chat sort of stuff, let's get right to the action, shall we. I know that what we do is vitally important to the chaps in the trenches and I know that our work makes a difference in this bloody war, but if I don't ever have to go on another photographing sortie, I'll be happy as a lark. They are dreadfully dull, we fly up to the front, circle over some spot on the front lines and then fly back home. In the two weeks that I've been flying I've seen three Hun aeroplanes and they were quite a distance off from us. That all changed on the afternoon sortie on the 10th and both the morning and afternoon sorties today. First let me describe the action on the 10th, we had flown to the front for one of our photo sorties, which we had completed successfully and we turned for home. As we were proceeding, I saw a single Hun machine flying in the opposite direction back toward the front. I had the craziest of notions and I turned to pursue the Hun. In the meantime, I told Thayer of my intention and he seemed game, so on we flew. In a short time, I had positioned myself in front of the Hun roughly 50 meters ahead, but Thayer just sat there. I signalled him to fire, but nothing happened. All of this time I'm jockeying our bus around to keep the Hun in position and avoid stalling, and nothing happened. Exasperated, I turned for home and said nothing the entire flight back. Once on the ground, I had a few choice words with Thayer, respectfully of course, the old boy does outrank me. He said some such nonsense of not having a clear shot. I was dreadfully worried that Thayer didn't have the metal for this game of ours. Well, let me tell you I couldn't have been more shocked by his behaviour in both of today's sorties. We took off at our usual time this morning for our usual photo sortie. When we arrived at the front I spotted two Hun aeroplanes approaching from the southeast and lower than our altitude. I was waiting for Lieutenant Epps to signal, but he continued with the mission at hand. I thought to myself, I'll give Thayer another opportunity. So, I dove and began to position myself in front of the trailing Hun aeroplane. I can only imagine what the Hun was thinking because he made no effort to prevent me from accomplishing my mission. Once in position, Thayer opened up like a whole hoard of Huns were attacking and before I knew what had happened the Hun aeroplane dropped a wing and plunged to Earth. I spun around and there sat Thayer with the biggest Cheshire cat grin I've ever seen.



We rejoined Lieutenant Epps and completed our mission and returned to St. Pol. After we landed, Lieutenant Epps ran over and started pounding on our backs exclaiming, "Bloody good show, old man!" over and over. After we filled out the necessary paperwork, I asked Thayer what happened, he laughed and said, "I told you I didn't have a good shot the other day." If that had been all that happened today, I would have been completely satisfied, but Thayer wasn't finished. In our afternoon sortie, which was of course another opportunity to take photos of the front, we arrived at our usual location and began taking photographs. This afternoon was quite busy with at least 6 Hun planes zipping around taking care of their business. As we were leaving, I saw a lone Hun flying over the front and I thought to myself 'Why not have a go at that old boy.' I informed Thayer of my intent, received a huge grin in reply and began to gently dive and position myself in front of this Hun. Once again, the Hun just sat and watched me getting into position. Could it be that the Huns don't know that we have Lewis guns up front with our observers? Anyway, once in position, Thayer began to fire that Lewis for all it was worth. This poor Hun burst into flames and began the long plunge Earthward. For a moment, I actually felt dirty for what I had done, it was like putting cattle down when it's slaughtering time. I turned to look at Thayer and he had that grin again, I wonder if maybe I've created a monster.



We landed and again Lieutenant Epps was overjoyed at our success. Needless to say, both claims were confirmed and we were quite the sensation at mess tonight. It does worry me a little that Thayer might be enjoying this business a little too much. Well, I'll wrap this journal entry up for today and retire. I'm sure I have another photo gathering sortie in the morning.

Almost There
Sgt, Rfc
2 Sqn War-birds Rising
Flanders


June 12, 1915.



2 Ships posted for morning Arty Spot. I was tasked to photo the shoot although I dont know why Hq cant just go to the lines and watch ?

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Afternoon Flight: The Sqn put up 3 machines on Recon to the Eastern limit of our A.O. across from Arras. I say what a sitter. However, the flight was peaceful no enemy about and done from 2000 meters.

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Points 2 ea flight.

hmmm did all that but ...only default is used.
my DIII skin works though??????

Double check your naming of the file. I missed the "Off" part at the start at first and it wouldn't work. Cavaliere put me right.

I flat-out copy and paste the name from another skin and just add a letter or 2 at the end to make it stick out in the list; no problems missing a letter, or syntax, etc.

Banjoman,Congratulations on the 2 victories. At this rate you will be an ace in no time! Have not seen an enemy machine yet in my campaign, which is fine as it is a long war. Good on ya mate.

I hope Banjoman stays far away from my man Arnold and his Aviatik BI

MudWasp, it is almost criminal, these Aviatik B.I pilots don't even try to evade. You really could rack up a pretty high score if you wanted, but I think I'll try and keep Thayer in check, not very sporting and all.

yeah .. I hope the next patch will give the Hun a rifle too !!

Hey CatKnight, just entered my log report for this week and I noticed that there isn't any way to enter our hours flown, don't we want to keep track of those?

Journal Entry: June 13, 1915
St. Pol-sur-mer

Surprise, surprise, this morning's mission was another reconnaissance sortie. We flew off, arrived at our part of the front and proceeded to take photos of the same part of the front that we photographed yesterday. I'm sorry if I sound frustrated, but I just think we could be doing so much more to help with the war effort, but who am I, I'm just a lowly sub-lieutenant and nobody asked me. Anyway, we saw a couple of Hun machines off in the distance but other than that it was just another typical sortie. We returned to St. Pol and enjoyed a wonderful luncheon. I'm rather fond of seafood and since we are right on the coast our mess sergeant can get most everything that we desire. I really don't know what he did before the war, but he can cook sole as well any restaurant that I've visited. After luncheon, a game of Whist will usually get started or some fellow will begin to play the piano while the others will drift off to take care of personal matters. Dear reader, that's just a small glimpse of a typical afternoon for the lads. We usually will leave for our afternoon sorties somewhere between 2 to 3 o'clock and today wasn't any different. Our mission was different, however, for today we were heading up to the front to do a line patrol. The difference being, this time we were specifically tasked with destroying Huns. I wonder if the success that Thayer and I have enjoyed had something to do with the change in our sortie. At any rate, we took off accompanied by Flight Commander Whiting and his observer, Lieutenant Gunn. We arrived at our patrol sector without incident and it wasn't long before I spotted a Hun aeroplane above us and flying toward our side of the lines. I looked toward FC Whiting and it didn't look like he had spotted the Hun so I began to climb to intercept him. I must have spooked the poor fellow because he began to turn for home. I continued the pursuit and eventually I was able to position ourselves where Thayer could engage. This Hun was made of better stuff because he at least tried to evade, but to no avail, Thayer was finally able to down him with a burst to his engine. He died in the most horrible of ways, plummeting to Earth like a comet.



We landed, were congratulated by Whiting and Gunn and filed our reports. Today's action brings our total to three. I think I'm beginning to see the wisdom in Thayer's last words to me after we discussed today's action, "We need to get while the getting is good." I foresee a day where I will pine for these days.