So, now that Rise of Flight is on Steam...

[sandman2575]

The plane I've always found hardest to control -- by far -- is the Camel. (I only ever fly the scouts -- never tried the Gotha etc.)  In turns, the Camel has a very frustrating tendency to stall into a spin that is *impossible* to recover from. With most other planes, I can feel the stall coming on or know when I'm putting too much stress on the airframe, but with the Camel, I just can't seem to avoid those death spirals even if I"m being super careful.

[Nefaro]

The plane I've always found hardest to control -- by far -- is the Camel. (I only ever fly the scouts -- never tried the Gotha etc.)  In turns, the Camel has a very frustrating tendency to stall into a spin that is *impossible* to recover from. With most other planes, I can feel the stall coming on or know when I'm putting too much stress on the airframe, but with the Camel, I just can't seem to avoid those death spirals even if I"m being super careful.

All rotary-engined planes are more difficult to control, due to their excessive torque/precession making the aircraft want to roll, or ground loop, to various degrees.  For the same reason, this instability can also allow them to roll & turn in one direction far faster then regular in-lines.  That's why the Camel and Fokker Dr.I had such a reputation for both insane maneuverability and killing their less experienced pilots.

They also usually don't have an adjustable throttle, but a couple RPM settings.  This is one area I think they skimped on realism for easier control since some of the original rotary engines only had one setting - full speed.  But pilots used fuel enrichment settings & such, along with the very helpful "blip" switch (which is in game), to moderate it. 

This is just the tip of the details iceberg.  I suggest studying up on some tips regarding flying a craft with a Rotary Engine in ROF, to better understand all the oddities.  Even so far as studying each type.  It's not the same as flying other aircraft. 

The most well known rotaries in ROF = most of the Sopwiths & Nieuports, and the Fokker Dr.I.   The reason that the Sopwith Camel and Fokker DrI are the most notable, regarding crazy handling characteristics, is they were late war iterations having low weight mixed with higher horsepower rotary engines than earlier stuff which made them even more susceptible. 

The Nieuports had some exceptionally weak wings, so be careful overspeeding them in a dive & pulling on the stick at high speeds.  Also be aware that you can blow a rotary engine by overspeeding the prop, especially with the Dr.I in ROF.  Just takes experience to know where the edge is, per usual.  Fortunately for us we don't have to die finding that out, as they regularly did back then.

[Jack Nastyface]

Update:  I just picked up ALL the add-ons on sale with the exception of the classic bombers and Ilya Muromets, although I haven't installed a played them, yet.  I am absolutely LOVING this game, although I am still flying against rookie enemy AI pilots.  Perhaps the only thing I wish was was included was the classic "creaking" sound of the air frame that occurred in Red Baron II when you were pulling hard G's.

[Father Ted]

You don't need to install anything: everything in the game is already there - it gets unlocked when you pay for it.  The creaking of the airframe...A couple of years back, one of the periodic updates introduced a bug which intermittently silenced the engine sound.  When that happened, we found we could hear all those noises - they were just hidden.  Like it or loathe it, this sim has a pretty awesome attention to detail.

[Jack Nastyface]

Hey Father Ted,
I bought my add-ins via steam, so there is a little bit of "copy the activation code to the clipboard" dance that you have to do between steam and riseoflight.com.  Took me all of 5 minutes to do.


Jumped into an early war Nieuport last night and shot down a few rookie eindeckers.  I think I am going to have to bump the enemy AI soon.
Also...isn't there a two-seater that features some kind of light 37mm gun?  I thought I saw something of that ilk, sometime ago.
Edit:  or maybe it was just this: [size=78%]http://www.dieselpunks.org/profiles/blogs/knights-of-the-air-sky-cannons[/size]