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[cbradbury]

First off, I never fly dogfight missions. I have zero skills in that area, and no real interest in it anyway. I spend a lot of time constructing and flying recon and transport missions of my own, enjoying the flying and maps rather than looking over my shoulder every few seconds. I am just wondering how many others do the same.

It's not all transport, though. I do fly a lot of maritime missions as well, although usually single aircraft like the Catalina, especially night operations against small convoys or individual ships.

I am also a big fan of the light bombers, too, particularly outdated aircraft such as the Blenheim I.

Lately we have been supplied with vastly improved seaplane cockpits, and I have been spending a lot of time with them. Again, mostly transport, as many do not have sufficient payload to be a really effective combat aircraft.  I do tend to disable the grid location, forcing me to navigate via dead reckoning and pilotage. If the instruments on a specific plane are good enough, I also tend to remove all the 'bottom left' info and fly via the instruments alone.

What I am really asking is whether there would be much call for missions of that type here? Most of you fighter jocks would find my missions boring and childishly easy, of course. Anyway, an example of my typical missions are:

Base transfer
Air sea rescue
Run spare parts out to a disabled ship/sub
Minelaying
Night attacks on shipping/bases
Recon
Coast Watcher/agent delivery, pickup, and supply.

These can be quite challenging once you disable all the on screen support!

[Dimlee]

I'm sure there are people who enjoy non-combat missions. By the way, some of the best campaigns I remember contained such missions as training, rescue, recon, etc.
For myself, I made recon missions for Ar 234 trying to cover the longest distance possible. When MBR-2 appeared, I enjoyed flights over the sea in "full real" settings...until my eyes got too strained by looking at the instruments.
Late Beebop was a master of "non-combat" stuff... His missions can be found on M4T.

[cbradbury]

Yes, I liked Bebop's missions (sadly missed). Vampire pilot has produced some good ones, too.

[UberDemon]

I enjoy them as well, but as variations on the theme of combat.  Otherwise I'd be spending time on other flight simulators that have no combat ability.

Something I always though would be nice would be to use a "bombsight" as a recon camera, and having some way of tying that to the objective of the mission.  Recce is always fun, whether it is pictures, or perhaps radar use or other function.

In a post yesterday I remember that some years ago I was working on a mod for the He-111Z to bring it to the planned Z-2 standard that would be used for long range reconnaissance (using the pylons with drop tanks) or heavy bombing using the pylons for large bombs (with combination of drop tanks).  When I started the Java work I was designing a position that was a non-functioning bombsight just for the purpose of taking pictures in Recce missions.  Of course at the time I thought I could come up with some form of coding for tying that action to the objectives... I think that is hard now that I think about it.

That harddrive crashed, I lost all the files I was working on that mod and some other ones I had started.  I never went back to finish it.  Oh well.  I have better ways of backing up my stuff now.

[WxTech]

A driving impetus in my foray into effects modding was my predilection toward the pew pew, bang bang aspects of combat flight. Turn fighting is my passion, and destruction is my philosophy. 

But I like campaigns that toss in a mix of missions. To the point, even, where atypical, ahistorical flying would be concerned. Such as a fighter pilot being tasked with bomber ferrying, or flights in planes normally outside a real world combat assignment. All to boost the variety.

I like Demon's camera notion. It seems to me that it could be a 'weapon' or a C&C object. To succeed, the 'weapon' would have to be 'released' while the plane is inside a defined circle centered on the target. For oblique photography, the bombsight would have to be aimed within a smaller circle centered on the target while the plane is within a larger circle. A really sophisticated treatment could consider the presence of the cumulus clouds, in the manner for AI visibility.

[Kopfdorfer]

I love flying all types of missions.
Sometimes just flying and navigating in poor weather is more exciting than combat.
Try flying a Storch across Normandy during the summer of 1944 !
That's a mission !
Variety as they say ( someone did , anyway ) is the spice of life.

Kopfdorfer

[UberDemon]

Variety as they say ( someone did , anyway ) is the dpice of life.
Kopfdorfer

YES! It is the dpice!

Couldn't resist.  But yes, I like a variety of missions, especially in campaigns.

[Gaston]

By the way, some of the best campaigns I remember contained such missions as training, rescue, recon, etc.

Interesting ! Can you tell us which ones ? Those missions can be extremely challenging !!!

[Type83Fighter]

Indeed. I do love long distance patrol missions (well, as far as a 1920s/30s biplane can go).

[Dandolo513]

Hallo ,
Something like patrolling over Pacific islands with a seaplane or radar patroller  searching for enemies 's activities

[Draken]

I would like a long range mission over the sea to search submarines .
But I am not sure if the depht charges can destroy a submerged submarine .

[Kopfdorfer]

Long ago I built and flew a mission in a PBY from Tulagi all the way to
Kahili - took a long time , and the PBY ran out of fuel -
which it would not have done historically.

Kopfdorfer