Hello, friends.
Someone on another post mentioned he'd really like to see a good BoB campaign; and I must say I would too. So I started building it. Did most of the flowcharting at work last night; the basic plotline, and wrote the first test mission just now.
BUT:
A couple of questions.
First; European Theater aircraft. There are no stock ETO 'planes for CFS2, so I'll have to use addons. My initial thought was to go with all 1%'s from AvHistory.org, but to my knowledge, while great the 1%'s can be framerate heavy from time to time; and I don't want to stick to small formations - I want to be able to replicate Bader's Big Wings. So; a couple of options, as I see it: 1) Go with all 1%'s and hope the framerate's OK for most people, 2)use the stock CFS1 aircraft adjusted accordingly for CFS2 (Haven't tried that yet; don't know how easy it would be), 3) use 3rd-party aircraft from Simviation or other sites.
Which in your experience would be the best way to go? I'm going to test them all; but need advice from others who may be familiar with CFS2 ETO craft. Keeping in mind of course I'll need 5 planes: the Mk1 Hurricane, Mk 1 Spit, Ju87, Ju88, He-111.

2nd problem: In my copy of CFS2, all ETO objects (static and mobile) are prefaced by an asterisk. Question: Does this simply denote ETO scenery, or is it possible that some versions of CFS2 have these objects and others don't? Important to know; I never really had to ask before. I'm going to try to keep ground objects to a relative minimum and use PTO objects whenever possible; but if those ETO objects are only in some versions (which I've seen in other games) there would be a problem.
Thanx!

Yep; exactly what I was looking for, Hagar, Thanks!

Looks great, Hagar!
I'll whip up a quick 40-on-40 furball with AAA over a laden airfield - that should be a good acid test.
The campaign starts with the Hurricane; moves to the Spit; though not in the way the CFS1 campaign did.
I got this idea: One starts in CFS2 as a flight leader. Unrealistic. In my campaign; your pilot starts as the new guy; 6th pilot in a 6-plane flight. (Did this by not naming player aircraft and placing it on the ground with a named 3-plane flight. Mission instructions and messages during play give you your flight's orders.) Work your way up to flight lead; then eventually to squadron leader; being posted to a Spit squadron elsewhwere in the battle. I'm looking at 40 missions; since they're all air defence; shouldn't be a problem.
This'll be fun!

Hi all,

Saw someone mentioned that GroundCrew He111 - it really is an excellent aircraft.

While you're looking, check out their BoB Hurricane campaign - one of my favourites!

~S~

Pads

Thanks for the great info; Hagar.
I pretty much came up with the same - or a similar idea last night - to use the 1%'s for the player's team, and CFS1 models for the rest.
BUT - it's the 1% aspect - RealityX - that I really like so what I'm going to do is when I contact the 1% designers for permission to use their planes; I'm going to ask them for permission to replace the AI planes' models and textures with CFS1 stock. A shame; since some of those models - in particular the 1GR Emil - are truly lovely to look at. Ideally of course; it'll wind up with the flight and damage of the 1%'s (particularly their greatly increased toughness - blowing away a plane with 80 rds is a little too quick, I think), coupled with the easy frame-rates of the stock models. Hope they accept - I've tried it on a test and it works very well.
BTW - that 80-plane furball is a load test only. I've made some massive missions from time to time; but they really get difficult to control and far too unweildy at about 20+ a side; which will most likely be the maximum limit for the campaign itself. I find 16 a side - 4 flights of 4 each - to give the maximum excitement and danger while retaining control. 32 'planes winging around more than adequately fills up the sky; I'll bet you'd agree.
(sigh) The first thing i have to do is yet another uninstall/reinstall of CFS2 - I lost track of what's stock and what's not a long time ago; so it's about due...
Ick. 
Cheers!

If you have enough HD space I would suggest a duplicate install of CFS2 for the ETO. Rename the existing CFS2 directory folder with any other name. Then insert the CD & install in the usual way. Both installs will run independently.

When you're ready to upload the campaign there should be no problems using any 1% aircraft you wish as Player aircraft. The GC stuff Pads mentioned is posted in the same way. Check it out. http://www.groundcrewdesign.com/cfs2pack.htm

You don't need permission to use any files, simply tell users where to download them. I dislike this method & prefer to include all required elements with a campaign but this is not always possible.

Thanks again to both for excellent info.
I prefer to add everything as a single download as well Hagar; more like from the downloader's end how annoying it can be having to go get this file and that file... Much easier to set it up for players ahead of time - already a lot of work going into it; what's a little more?

My hat's off to you if you can get a big wing to assemble in CFS2. I tried it once. 5 Spitfire squadrons to assemble with 4 Lancaster bombers over southern england to bomb a target in the Calais area. Bloody nightmare getting them all to arrive at the right time. Then to stop them colliding on the runway. (Used 4 different airfields too.) I got it working fairly well after a time. Certainly looked good.