Maybe I am missing something, but after opening your mission files, I don't see much variety in missions.
What was your intention, maybe I can help with your MOD for mission files. I am very familiar with it as well as the campaign.xml file.
You are right. TBH at the moment it seems me that, historically-wise regarding fighters, 'offensive patrol' and 'German side front line patrol' for respectively on one hand BEF and on the other hand French & German, won't be too far from reality.
If you take balloon busting, assistance to 2-seaters, etc., those were secondary objectives and most likely not assigned firmly. I didn't say that they haven't been primary objectives sometimes, but on very rare occasions only, and therefore, adding such mission types wouldn't pay much credit to the fact that pilots were asked to patrol.
Now let me develop a bit more by taking only one example: balloon busting.
Balloon BustingThere's a good reason to explain why among aces, only a few were balloon busters (and for most of them, balloon busters only). Balloon busting wasn't a given objective. Therefore, it was a matter of specialists. I think this well-known quote of Karl Bodenschatz explains it all:
"Balloon-busting became an art form for them. There were men who specialized in it, who developed their own tricks and who had their established methods: to swoop down unexpectedly from a single scrap of cloud, or to put the sun at their backs, et cetera."
And what was true for Germany was true for every other countries. Talking about BEF, if I take Mannock's diary as a reference, I see only one mention of a balloon 'Strafe' as he called it. Here's a scan of his diary mentioning that event (I thought everyone would be interested in reading Mannock directly as he wrote lol). I think Mick's testimony gives a good reason why balloon busting was so rarely an assigned primary objective.
![[Linked Image]](https://i.imgur.com/unf6LST.jpg)
"9 May 1917 (Wednesday)
Lots of exciting news to tell. Went over the lines from north of Arras to five miles behing the German trenches at a height of less then fifteen feet, attacking hun balloons. That was on the 7th - a Monday. Six of us - Captain Nixon (missing), Hall, Scudamore, Redler, Parry and myslef. All expect the Captain (only been with us two days - the new flight-commander referred to in my last note) returned safely but with machines almost shot to pieces. Hall crashed on home aerodrome, as did Scudamore, Parry crashed just our side of the lines at the Canadian H.Q. Redler crashed at Savy, but returned here later and damaged his machine on landing."
And now, talking about the French, 2 examples:
- Fonck eventually wrote that he was used to lead balloon attacks as a manner to provoke German scouts. In other words, the primary objective wasn't the balloons but fighting with enemy single seaters (he didn't shot one drachen down, and I can check, but I'm pretty sure that not many balloons have been really attacked during those fake balloon 'strafe' neither by Spa 103 nor sister escadrille Spa 26).
- Nungesser, who was both a balloon buster and a fighter, started his balloon busting career attacking a balloon as a volunteer, with his CO and few squaddies as an escort. See below a scan of Spa 65 logs
![[Linked Image]](https://i.imgur.com/Va6NzUG.png)
"2 April Report 1° 2 Offensive reconnaissance’s one of 7, one of 5
([pilots])
Adj Nungesser attacks a L.V.G., above Verdun between 7h and 9h. The aircraft must be severely damaged.
2° Drachen attack Verdun region between Sercourt and Septsarges by Adj Nungesser escorted by Captain Court, Lt Le Sort and MdL Courdin from 17h to 18h15. The Drachen takes fire and falls vertically.
After having explained all this about balloon busting, my question is: does balloon busting really need to be included in the game as a mission type? And, this question is valid for other mission types (except patrol).
That being said, I'm just asking questions and I'd be glad to enrich mission types of the mod. Of course, if you want to help, your help is more than welcome. ;^)
