Find an online war with no icon/full difficulty settings, and IL2 trully shines and will left you savor each successfull landing, maybe even with a kill or two.
We fly in
Forgotten SkiesHere's a description that we send out to new players:
FS is dog fight based but you still only have 1 life. You can fly multiple sorties - landing, re-spawning and take-off again but you must wait 5 minutes from the time you landed until you spawn a new aircraft. If you die or are captured you are done for the night. If you ditch in friendly territory there is a 20 minute delay before you can re-up. If you bail out in friendly territory there's a 30 minute delay before you can re-up. Its important that when you bail out you wait until your aircraft has hit the ground before hitting 're-fly'. Once you hit re-fly please EXIT THE GAME and come back in (its DF so you can come and go just like you can on the public DF servers - War Clouds for example). The reason we ask that you exit after bailing is that even though you hit re-fly your chute will still be in the air until you exit the server or re-spawn a new plane. Since there is a 30 minute delay you can't spawn a new aircraft - the only thing you can do is exit. If your chute is killed at any point - due to any reason - it will count as a death and you will done for the night. There's some sort of bug where the pilot sometimes slumps over and dies for no reason. You don't want to die under this type of circumstance.
FS uses several scripts - as mentioned if you die or are captured and try to spawn a new plane you will be auto kicked due to a script. If you fail to wait 5 minutes between landing and spawning a new plane you will be auto-kicked. If you try to re-up a new plane after ditching or bailing without waiting the full 20 or 30 minutes you will be auto kicked. Some aircraft have restricted gun and ordnance load-outs. If you select a banned load-out and spawn in you will be auto kicked. In each of these circumstances you can re-join the server. If you were killed or captured you still wont be able to fly and if you ditched or bailed you will still have to wait the 20 or 30 minutes to re-up. If you were kicked due to selecting a banned load-out you can fix that by changing the load-out and then spawning in.
Other notes - each side has a limited number of aircraft and each type of aircraft are also limited. If there are only 6 x P-38Js, and they are all in the air, if you try to up a seventh you will be auto kicked. Every aircraft lost is one less aircraft you get to use later. Also, FS uses a form of dead is dead in regards to 'persona'. To advance your persona you need to survive a mission and either kill something (ground or air) or you need to have flown for more then 50 minutes (over multiple sorties) and land.
The current campaign is Italy Phase 3 (July 1944). We are 2 missions in and the whole phase will run for 10 missions. Missions run on Sunday, Tuesday and Friday. Friday night we will be running mission 2. Each mission is 90 minutes and being dogfight based we typically fly multiple sorties. We can land, re-plane and take-off as many times as necessary - remember to wait 5 minutes after landing before spawning a new plane. Of course being DF based there is no AI - every enemy you run into will be a human.
We have had a high of 105 players and normally have around 80.
The current plane set based on 300 planes per side:
AlliesFighters (80%):2% P-39N-1 - 6 to start - min: 1
2% P-39Q-1 - 6 to start - min: 1
4% P-39Q-10 - 12 to start - min: 2
16% P-40M - 48 to start - min: 6
4% P-51B - 12 to start - min: 1
4% P-51D-5NT - 12 to start - min: 2
3% P-47D-27 - 9 to start - min: 1
12% P-47D-22 - 36 to start - min: 5
13% P-38J - 39 to start - min: 5
7% Spitfire Mk.VIII - 21 to start - min: 3
4% Spitfire Mk.VIII CW - 12 to start - min: 2
4% Spitfire Mk.IXc - 12 to start - min: 2
5% Spitfire Mk.IXc CW - 15 to start - min: 2
Bombers (20%) 3% A-20C - 9 to start - min: 1
17% B-25 - 51 to start - min: 7
AxisFighters (80%):4% Bf 109G-6 Early - 12 to start (w/ Mk 108) - min: 2
40% Bf 109G-6 Late - 120 to start - min: 16
13% Fw 190A-6 - 39 to start - min: 5
7% Fw 190F-8 - 21 to start - min: 3
16% MC.205 III - 48 to start - min: 6
Bombers (20%) 5% Ju 88A-4 - 45 to start - min: 6
5% He 111H-6 - 15 to start - min: 2
Map:
Maps:
2D (click on thumbnail):
3D with adjusted contrast - helps bring out the topographical features (click on thumbnail):
We fly and have flown and fly with various AH and Warbirds transplants. I only flew Bf 109s - I only flew them in AH and flew them the exact same way. Their are pilots who have mastered their aircraft in Il-2 - 10 of us in Bf 109G-6 Lates fought 4 P-38Js for 40 minutes and had to pull back due to lack of fuel. There are differences in the FMs between Il-2 and AH but nothing terribly drastic. Both are fun games. The biggest issue AH'rs have that have flown with us are the fact we fly on 'full difficulty' meaning no icons, no map GPS marker. The dots while difficult to positively ID most folks get used to them and for the most part we can predict what they are (and at times who they) by how they fly. Most AH'rs get accustomed to the dots and the head positions. Navigation on the other hand is what seems to bug folks the most.
We have tricks and aids and we set up 'circuits' so that we are patrolling between set land marks. The more folks fly the more they learn the terrain:
Example of our flight plan:
2D (click on thumbnail):
3D (click on thumbnail):
Throw in some rudimentary math and clocking reading and its np.
To the original poster:
I don't play on public DF servers very much any more. Especially recently since the game has be hacked. However, the FS community is full of respectable players and we all try to have fun. Depending on what you want from the game there are numerous public DF servers with less then full difficult settings.
If you already have the game the just download and install
Hyperlobby and try it. I send guy from Il-2 over to AH all the time to give it the 2-week trial.
Anyway, have fun
