wacky wings wondering around inside the box

[spookiedfx]

Suspending disbelief while flying your models.......Do you have a favorite side of the war? Do you imagine yourself being victorious in combat? Do you imagine your opponent as an experienced pilot from that era? Do you wonder what the pilot would have really done and try to apply it (I would assume in reinactment campains)? ok some do, some dont on a regular basis. I imagine at one time or another most have imagined or fantasized about things in the game. So is this a fantasy game if you use your imagination to put yourself in an albatros as an ace hunting prey? I know who cares.

[Tonx]

OK ... Yes. Yes. Some of the time and I guess yes. My gaming dream came true when my Wife first said to me Let's go and see what Wings of Glory is all about. But never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that my sister would become interested in the game eventually too: In this family / distant family Girls versus Boys = BAD idea!

The Wife's current ideal fantasy game (FFS) is probably still sticking Yell in her gunsights (both versions of the game / any type) and keeping her there with finger firmly on trigger! (Pick a jammed guns card please ...) My ideal game in response to this involves one heading towards the other into a cloud (fogged by me as God / term for the supernatural creation of an illusion of some kind) and so when they consequently meet each other I will have banged their heads together! But HOPEFULLY these fantasy games situations will change for the better. Sooner the better because it's getting boring now!

Like Yell with her Great Grandfather (adoptive family) and she has had some really vivid WW1 dreams and visions since she began to look into his service in The Great War (Survived) one of my Grandfathers was Flying Officer Bob Dunkin RAF (KIA September 13th 1940) who was killed flying a Boulton-Paul Defiant Mk I. The other was killed in Tunisia in 1943 and I am the only member of my family other than my Aunty Dinah (now deceased) to have visited his grave. At one point Yell's visions were becoming so vivid I was getting a little bit worried about her ... She was beginning to describe a WW1 airfield (Les Cruces) and nearby Suippe (The Somme) in detail as if she had actually been there. This was around the same time that I went into Rehab (December last year) over my disability - then once this had happened it all stopped very suddenly: The verdict on what she was dreaming was stress.

I have put myself in the cockpit during a few of my WGS games and pitted myself against a real opponent sometimes being lucky but on other occasions walking back home again: The one thing thank goodness I have never drawn in these games is a Boom Card / explosion token.

I tend to dream about stupid and unexplainable stuff because I am on aripiprizole for the rest of my life and it does at times cause some weird s**t to go off in my head. Mind you that is better than quetiapine which is what I was on previously which just deadens your mind so much you don't dream at all - and sleep all the time too. Three nights ago I had a dream that I was playing WGF on cocaine that was amusing to recall ... There is frequently a drinking element to playing Wings of Glory in the UK which I am sorry to say that I will always dislike but nobody has ever tried what I dreamt of in real life to my knowledge! Mind you I reckon that I will now not escape having dreams about playing Kingdom Death now I know much more about this game - have you heard of or seen it. RPG full of half-dressed animes etc and very expensive to get going with - Kickstarter Set GBP £450.00 etc. But I suppose I can but dream about playing it - or collecting and building / painting the miniatures

[Shadowcat]

I like WWI air combat for the same reason I run DAK (Afrika Korps) in WWII games. In a otherwise gritty Mean war these theaters had some honour to them (in as much as you can in a war).

The whole knights in the sky thing for WWI pilots and some of the stories I have read about fighting in the desert for WWII. No interest in all for WWI ground combat but talk the air war or Jutland naval battle and I am there. Same for WWII, most run their SS or Soviet guard units, I am happy with DAK or French armies. In the 70's it was Richtofens War by Avlon hill, in the 80's it was Dawn patrol by TSR (still have both) the 90's was Knights in the Sky WWI computer game on my old computer. Ok...took a 10 year break but now it is this game.

As for getting into the game, in the demo game when my Fokker D7 was down to 4 HP I started pulling out of the fight and running for the sideline (made it also...on my last HP). Other players looked at me funny like why did I leave the fight when I still had HP left. Had to explain my buddy and I were playing Dawn patrol games with characters 20 years ago and we both would pull out to conserve our pilots when the planes got shot up...just like in real war. Still have that instinct 20 years later.

[milcoll73]

Suspending disbelief while flying your models.......Do you have a favorite side of the war? Do you imagine yourself being victorious in combat? Do you imagine your opponent as an experienced pilot from that era? Do you wonder what the pilot would have really done and try to apply it (I would assume in reinactment campains)? ok some do, some dont on a regular basis. I imagine at one time or another most have imagined or fantasized about things in the game. So is this a fantasy game if you use your imagination to put yourself in an albatros as an ace hunting prey? I know who cares.

yes. i tend to favor germany because of my family history and their, generally, more attractive aircraft but ill fly any side just to be flying!!!1
when im maneuvering im in the cockpit in my minds eye. i try to fly them like a real pilot might have but, at the end of the day, it is a game and concessions must be made.

[spookiedfx]

Thank you gentlemen for your contribution, I started this thread to show the differences between gamers who try to keep it realistic and those who dont mind, lets say flying snoopy's dog house. No matter what side you support or what planes you fly, most of us will suspend disbelief, fantasize if you will about a portion of the game at one point or another. I think its more about how much truth we are willing to apply to our gaming practice to keep it fun. To play an exact reinactment of something that actually happened in ww1 is not a game, its placing models in a demonstrative manner. None of us could possible know what a world war 1 pilot would have been thinking as he fights his planes controls in freezing temperatures while being sprayed in the face with hot engine oil and smeared goggles. We elect to fly in comfortable conditions in a nice cushy chair with a beer or soda and some snacks. We raise an eyebrow and go in for an unobstructed kill. So if someone suggest a game with a custom game piece of a craft that never really flew, lets say snoopy's dog house is it any more different than putting yourself in an Albatros as an Ace pilot?

[Tonx]

Kermit please allow me to reiterate how creativity is something that must never be sneered at ... Or thought of as arty-farty for example. Creativity on many occasions has lead to wealth and even power in some instances.

I seriously like the way you emphasise that there is no way in our typical gaming locations we can emulate the thoughts of an individual at war and particularly when in combat: With both wars now rapidly receding into bygone era status the closest we are ever able to come to getting just a taster of what serving in them was like is ancestral research and the reading of memoirs.

Over on Airliners.Net we have a similar situation with armchair pilots who think they know what a medical diversion feels like to have to execute or how one feels as an engine is shut down seconds after take-off. Now this I can relate to directly as every six months we were line-checked as pilots and this included the testing of ability and responsibility along with aptitude and skill. But I can also describe how you feel having been told that a passenger's onboard situation is Going Med and then turning Med Assist ... With Bangor in Maine where that Boeing 767 was put into still over 100 miles away. You know someone's life is counting on your every move and you frequently have to make an unplanned landing at an unfamiliar location ... Plus of course you also get the odd goon who says that they are an Emirates Captain based at Manchester when all crew are domiciled in Dubai / UAE or that they once flew as Concorde Duty Flying Crew ... But their date of birth ends something like 1985! Which of course is not creativity it's just plain lies & I have caught out five individuals on there since I joined who had until then appeared credible ... I am not nicknamed Captain Cowell for no reason within the industry where I now help to train pilots thanks to my disability preventing me from actually flying any further! Well - the odd sailplane now and again especially up in the Yorkshire Pennines - FUN FUN FUN!!!

The only thing anybody with creativity has to have an awareness of is when they are becoming outspoken or outnumbered: Which again must not be feared but handled appropriately - either gather facts to corroborate your idea or support your idea together or have one or two effective arguments in favour of your idea to hand. Or if it really is going irretrievably wrong a way out / an exit strategy and the guts to say that you at least gave the idea your best shot!

For example: This diagram was approved as a pilot psychology tool and if needs be an air accident investigation aid in 2011.



I should know ... I designed it.