OBD: Latest Development News, 18th August 2021

After the resounding success of Wings Over Flanders Fields Between Heaven & Hell II, we are now turning our attention to Wings Over The Reich.
We aim to bring to WOTR all the new features that have made BH&H II a critically acclaimed success. The brilliant revised Scenery, New High Resolution Maps,
Animations to bring more immersion to the feeling of flight, and in the cockpit, plus other features to be announced soon.

Brilliant Pol, looking forward to it.

Yes very good news Pol. I'm looking forward to the development of WOTR. Some more British aircraft to shoot down, the Blenheim and maybe the Short Sunderland or Whitley bomber. Then perhaps some more flyables, the 110 and the Stuka maybe.

So much potential!

I can't stand it! When when!?

We will have another session with Rick Rawlings I'm sure... the last one I did with WoTR I got marmalised!

Waiting patiently...........well sort of.

S!Blade<><

Is it done yet? It's been almost 2 weeks!

14 days... be sure!

No love for the Heinkels?
I'd feel too sad to shoot down a Sunderland gotta say.
Imagine a flyable one.

S!Blade<><

NR - I love them all! I'm just thinking what the devs might achieve in the first major update.

As for the Sunderland, they had quite a few around the coast so it would make sense. Quite a few of the early Luftwaffe aces knabbed one. You could throw the Defiant in there as well.

I do fancy the Stuka given the preponderance of attackable ground targets.

Well?........ it is soon, but is it soon enough?

S!Blade<><

“For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and rested the seventh day and went to the pub. It was a tough gig for the Lord. Motorhead performed and the brethren shaved their heads and spat as Lemmy the disciple sermonized on the evils of Disco and Rap and Kanye West. The Lord intervened and said unto Lemmy 'let there be rock.' And there was rock. And He said upon the brethren 'Let there be a WotR update'. The brethren were stunned into a drooling silence.'Yo' said one, with piercings in his brow. Then it shall be so said The Lord. And it was. 2 weeks."

Hallo @Pol,

only a short question:
Do you also work on a changed FM? I think about the 109, f.e. During fight the FM has a high level in my opinion. You must concentrate, work much with the flaps in the curves (maybe too much?) and handle all (engine, rudder) very sensitive. On the other side it is very easy to start and land.

And just let me remember on this:
https://SimHQ.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/4531881/fm-bf109-nose-moves-down-always#Post4531881

Thanks and Greetings!

We are aiming to look at FMs Becker01 but no promises.

Anything to tease us with that you can share a Pol

Having to buy WOTR again, I wonder if this is going to be an UPDATE, or is it going to be WOTR II?

It's not WOTR II, it will be something that adds-on to WOTR. All details TBC.

As posted on CA..



and a new one...

Much improved terrain?

Great stuff cheers Pol.

Various terrain improvements - we have imported a lot of the improvements from WOFF to WOTR and also created new trees, new better rendering of them into the distance, for all types of trees in all seasons and snow variations, the winter trees especially look better, Airfield (facility) trees will match terrain trees better. We haven't published a list yet so when ready we will...

Do I spy new bump mapping on the Spit as well??

Looking good Pol. That Spitty pic needs to go in the gallery on the shop page for sure. That is an incredible pic. The trees and scenery look really good in the other pic as well. Nice Work!

S!Blade<><

Hello all, here's a few more recent pics from work in progress..

New scenery, Spitfire MKIb, head animations added etc.

fantastic Pol.

Yes, it's all looking good
One thing though, will the aircraft be getting a 'used' look... at the moment they all look like they have been part of a preserved collection of airshow specimens... if you are going up two or three times a day to fight Jerry they should look a bit 'weary'...

Thanks there's an argument for new, tatty, and in between depending on if it's a newer aircraft delivery or not, but we are working on textures some so will see.

I find it helps to reduce 'Glossiness' (or whatever it's called) in Workshops.



Shine is part of the problem. People who saw (and touched!) it said of RAF camouflage finishes that 'Close examination of the aircraft showed the camouflage paint to be very rough when touched, thick and very matt so that the aeroplanes gave the impression of being very badly finished, this always seeming to be more true of bombers than fighters' (MJF Bowyer in 'RAF Camouflage & Markings of WW2, PSL1975).

It's said that Luftwaffe finishes were slightly glossy, but the usual pic I have seen used to illustrate this showed a Jagdgruppe 50 aircraft which was polished to help it catch Mosquitoes; mostly they look quite matt to me in service, or even ex-works.

Undersurfaces in WotR generally look very clean and bland to me...





...but reducing Glossiness helps lose the 'preserved warbird' look.

PS the 20mms in the Spit Ib rarely worked and 19 Squadron had to plead to get its .303 aircraft back, putting up with the cannon for just over a month, before getting the ones with (fixed) cannon and four MGs about November.

Yes for sure, many modern versions of the aircraft are painted and polished to look good, but often they were duller then.

On RAF 19 yes we are considering how best to have the cannons behave. Of course if it's too bad I am sure no one will want to fly it like RAF 19 -

Although even after they requested to go back to their 8 MG they continued to use cannon Spitfires throughout the Battle of Britain


Yes glossiness is a user setting in Workshop so people can have it how they prefer.

'RAF Fighter Squadrons in the Battle of Britain' by Anthony Robinson is based on official records, mainly Combat Reports and squadron ORBs, and covers 19 Squadron. It's reported their first combat with the MkIBs (with which they were fully re-equipped by 22 July) was on 2 August and their last on 3rd September, after which they were relieved at Digby (they were kept out of 109 range as they were deemed unsuitable for fighter-v-fighter combat) by 616 Squadron while 19 changed back to 8-gun Spits, taken from an OTU. With which MG-armed aircraft they were back in action on 5th September. They got a single Mk IB back in early October and on 5th November, tried it out in action, reporting a 109 shot down.

This is all looking fantastic! The new scenery is simply breathtaking.

Would it be okay to make some critiques concerning the model of the cannon Spit? The shell ejection port, I think, may be in the wrong place (should be a larger cut-out next to the wheel well, the model appears to have that of the innermost Browning of an A wing):



The early version of the underside magazine fairing is absolutely correct however!

It simply may be an artefact of the angle of the screenshot, but feel like the cannon barrels and fairings themselves are a bit short and the muzzle brake is a bit small? Their furthest extent should line up more or less with the front of the first exhaust manifold:



As far as I'm aware, the 30 sets of cannon wings produced for the "Mk Ib" were essentially the pattern for the B wing; wherein they were all constructed with one cannon bay and the two outer machine gun bays, whether or not they fitted the latter or not. (The history surrounding it is a bit confusing; No. 19 Squadron operated a few cannon-only Spits as early as June/July but it seems the rest of the complement, especially by August (the first was received on 11/08/40 as indicated by the squadron ORB), were probably delivered with or converted to mixed armament: This thread has a lot of good info ) The last victory of a cannon Spit (QV-H, ser. R6776) was George Unwin's 11th victory, on the day the cannon Spits were withdrawn - it was certainly of mixed armament. The cannon Spitfire Is would eventually be fitted with Merlin 45s, larger oil coolers, and other modifications to become the first Mk Vs in November 1940. I hope we get to see the two armament types!

Aside from the lower magazine fairing, which was changed in the Mk IIb to the more common "lima bean" variant, the cannon wings on the "Ib" and the IIb/Vb/VIb should look externally identical. Internally they only substantially differed in the cannon mounting, ejection chutes, and the oil radiator

I have some drawings for the B wing I can send over! (PS. I've done a few Spits in GMAX myself and I'd happily do some free work as a helping hand on the side if need be ) I'm very excited for this cannon Spit as it will make a great basis for possibly the Mk IIb and Vb/VIb further down the line! Keep up the fantastic work

Edit:



I could be wrong but I believe Spitfires with the B wing had a manual cocking lever on the starboard side of the cockpit, which cleared the breeches of the cannon. Perhaps the gun-clearing mechanic from WoFF could be ported over?

Pleased to see continued development happening on the WOTR series gents.

Also very nice that continued focus is being given to the early WW2 period - always liked those transitional 'crates with part wood and part metal construction, so this one automatically goes into my shopping basket (purchase bin?) once it comes out. From what I can gather, this will be an add-on to WOTR instead of WOTR II, which is wonderfully efficient since it minimizes the no. of multiple installs of different editions of flight sims. that I have going on my rig (such as with my FrankenWOFF 4.18 and BH&H2 setups that, so far, are behaving nicely together ).

If I may give a kind suggestion: when working on this add-on for WOTR, could OBD check into the different sounds being used in WOTR and how the preload.xml file functions with those sounds. Upon first blast of the M.G.s, in any of the fighters (the BF-109, Spitties, and Hurries) - there is a brief pause in the sim. of about one second or so before all returns to normal - for some reason it is specifically related to aircraft gun sounds. (It is not a micro-stutter problem or FPS-drop problem - and never happens upon subsequent gun blasts - only the first time guns are fired.)

Cheers all and happy flying in those Spits (be they weathered or highly glossy),
Von S

Thanks guys we are still working on it so will check those items.

To be fair the Hurricane in most light is fairly bland underneath, when the sun hits from an oblique angle you see more in some photos. I will be looking at that stuff shortly anyway.

+1 on this - I wondered if this annoying pause was due to the texture effects loaded at the time or even the rain of empty.303 cases, but hadn't thought of sounds.

Seems the cocking lever was only used on the ground..

I've got most of the Spitfire "bibles" by Alfred Price and Spitfire: The History by Morgan/Shacklady so I'll comb through and see what us said about the early Cannon Spits. I know that the prototype Mk IB L1007 was fielded by several squadrons during trials in early 1940 (even before No 19 received their first in June) but I think that's outwith the scope of WoTR at present.

Here are the serials of the ca. 30 IBs:

R6761 R6770 R6776 R6809 R6833 R6882 R6888 R6889 R6890 R6897 R6904 R6908 R6911 R6912 R6917 R6919 R6923 R6924 R6958 R6960 X4062 X4106 X4159 X4231 X4257 X4272 X4279 X4342 X4476 X4482

Those taken on charge by No.19 can be found here here (some are erroneously marked down as Mk Ia however).

At least the first 3 were built with just 2 cannon and were delivered to No.19 Squadron in June/July. Most were probably converted to mixed armament by September 3rd, their final day of operations, if they were not already constructed to such a standard. On August 11th No.19 received their first aircraft with mixed "B" armament. No. 19 would in fact operate a complete complement of Mk IBs and operated no Mk IAs until September 3rd, whereon they received some through-the-mill Spits from an OTU.

It appears that when flying level the cannon tended to operate okay but under any G stoppages were almost inevitable. It was possible depending on luck that all ammunition in both cannon could be fired successfully but it was seldom:

16th August: 1/7 Spit IBs on ops fired without stoppages
19th August: 0/3!
24th August: 2/8
31st August: 3/6, so 50% - seemed to be a good day

Perhaps cannons jams could be coded randomly, with chance of stoppage increasing when manoeuvring?

The cannon stoppages were in fact due to initial method of ejecting shell casings. In the B-Wing Spitfires the cannon barrel was was mounted at the leading edge and fairing - the rest of the weapon slid along bearings whilst firing, ejecting a casing in its original position at the end of one firing cycle. The initial ejection slot was poorly positioned and too small therefore casings often stuck and blocked movement of the cannon whilst firing, thus jamming it. In the later modified Mk IBs (and all later B-Wing Spits), the first of which being delivered to No. 92 Squadron in November 1940, a better system for ejection had been designed and most of the problems were by then cured.

It seems the cocking valve would have done nothing to help, even if it were to be used in-flight.

Thanks for that Lythronax.

Hi all, we added a new NEWS page on the WOTR website which, to kick it off, has been updated with some new pictures and snippets of info from Work-in-progress on our new WOTR expansion. Full details are not released yet of exactly what we are making, but in time all will be revealed


Link in my signature, or

website
https://www.wingsoverthereich.com/
website news page
https://www.wingsoverthereich.com/news.htm

Great news Pol, it’s been a while since I’ve had any WW2 air combat “fix” So...its done in then

Great news - fyi the last pic on the news page is giving me a '404 Not Found' message when clicking on it (the pic named 'WOTR Expansion Terrain Shot...')

fix enabled for Adger and for the picture I think speck01.

"an exciting new campaign period and location of the air war is in development, and your campaign can now, smoothly and seamlessly, extend into other periods of the war"

Hurri Up! :

Spits coffee!

Very interesting. Looking forward to it. You might want to put a link to the WOTR page as I found 2 dead links here while while trying to find it.

S!Blade<><

OK will do. The website links are in my signature, but I guess if you have disabled those you won't see it.

"Also an exciting new campaign period and location of the air war is in development, and your campaign can now, smoothly and seamlessly, extend into other periods of the war - more details on that will be released at a later time, but do stay tuned."


I like the sound of this.....the size of the map allows so much opportunity for development.

I'm as excited as a very excited person who's got a special reason to be excited.

No, sigs are not disabled for me so I guess my only excuse is that I am a dumba$$??? I never even looked at your sig. Carry on, don't mind me.

Cheers!

S!Blade<><

Haha no problem. Thanks though, I found couple of old links that needed updating. If you still see one let me know please.

Any news?

We hope to update the website next week with some news so hang in there guys.

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Always lurking in the shadows I am.

S!Blade<><

OK we have updated the website with some new info and pictures, hope you guys enjoy!
https://www.wingsoverthereich.com

Looking good!

Good stuff Pol.

That Blenheim is stunning my word. Will she be flyable?.

Thanks, we shall see Lythronax. There are other aircraft to do, and we will see where we are later to chose which will be flyable and thus need the hefty work done to make virtual cockpits etc.

Some lovely shots of the Blenheim!

Completely understandable! The Blen has a lot of very busy interior stations and the modelling work would be quite taxing on time. Very excited to see what else is coming up! The new terrain is just lovely.

For those who may have missed it, a couple more screenshots were added to the website news section recently.

I for one did miss them Pol, wow the Blenheim and the rivers both look great

I say... that Ju 88 is painted the wrong colour. It could easily be mistaken for one of ours!

Nice pics Pol. I am looking forward to learning more about the next phase and the new career time period. The Bleny is looking sharp Sir.

S!Blade<><

I'm heartened and indeed encouraged that progress is progressing progressively. Head down Pol. Get them hours in ! Don't forget work/life/family balance but. We're all rooting for you son.

Thanks catch,

Just a brief update to say we are still alive. Work is continuing on the WOTR Expansion, but as a lot of what we are currently doing is "under wraps" for the moment we don't have any pics or details this time. When we are able to reveal more, we certainly will

Good news Pol. I am glad you posted over here because I was going to rip into you on the WOFF thread, for the new update, that you had better quit fiddling with WOFF BH&H II and get back to work on WOTR, but it seems that you and WM are juggling both and making progress. Don't burn the candle at both ends to much though. Take care and keep up the good work!!!

S!Blade<><

Just wondering if there's any news to be reported about the upcoming expansion! I know you guys have been working hard on WOFF 1.21 so I hope it's ok to ask!

Well we did focus on WOFF for the large V1.21 'Recon Wars' update for a few weeks, with a ticking over on WOTR too but we are back on WOTR 100% now. There's a lot to do, and we want to keep it a surprise for the moment. We think it will be worth it.

That's fantastic news! I'm hugely excited; I've been playing WoFF and WoTR a huge amount the past while and they've very much become my go-to sims (and have gotten the latter running very well finally) I can't wait to see more content for WoTR as it's far and away my favourite single player WW2 experience.

The boys are back circa 1940 ! I cannot contain myself. Somebody stop me !:

Dinner's ready Bruiser !