Now available for free download: Luftwaffe REDUX campaign for Cliffs of Dover; Operation Seelöwe
Mission design and storyline Heinkill, scripting by Bolox and Gabuzomeu, beta testing by W1ndy and BlackLionDownload self installer (.exe) here:
https://www.box.com/s/um183lta0m9n4pzwt4cqOr ZIP install file here:
http://airwarfare.com/sow/index.php/down...ampaign-seeloweSeelöwe, or Operation Sealion, was the planned invasion of England by German forces in the Autumn of 1940.
It never happened. But what if it had?
Using
REDUX campaign scripting by Bolox and Gabuzomeu, we have revisited the
stock CoD Luftwaffe campaign and completely reshaped it to craft an
Operation Sealion invasion campaign flown from the Luftwaffe
perspective.
You will fly as a pilot in the rebellious unit Stab I
(Jabo), I/JG53 – a unit of battle hardened Luftwaffe veterans who not
only took on the British, but also the Nazi high command during their
stay in France in 1940. In this scenario hand picked pilots, including
yourselves, have been selected to form a Bf109E4b Jabo, or ground attack
unit, to support ground forces in the invasion.
The Seelowe Luftwaffe REDUX campaign offers you both air to ground and air to air action, and:
-
takes you from the eve of the invasion, defending the invasion fleet at
Calais, to the full fury of the invasion in the skies and over the
cities of England.
- features the popular REDUX scripting of Bolox
and Gabuzomeu with air and ground kill counts, campaign victory totals,
and medals.
combat AI settings optimised to provide best possible aerial combat experience
-
missions including escort, airfield attack, sea convoy attack, shipping
cover, air convoy escort, AAA and AT suppression, combat air patrol
- daily combat reports, using period photographs, track the progress of the invasion
the
usual attention to ground object detail at airfields, ports and in
cities. Armour and ground forces clash on the ground below as you fight
in the skies above.
- historically appropriate order of battle on both sides, including Axis support by Italian forces
- compatible with TEAM FUSION mod v. 1(3)
- includes a 23 page readme with the history of Operation Sealion and the featured unit, JG53.
What's different to the popular RAF REDUX campaign?
Ground
attack! This is a jabo campaign with ground and air missions, so
naturally the campaign script keeps track of your ground kills, as well
as your air kills.
Installation and uninstallationThe
REDUX campaigns are supplied in a self installing EXE program. Run this
program and when prompted by the installer, browse to where you have
your ‘IL2 Sturmovik Cliffs of Dover’ directory, usually C:\Program Files
(x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\il-2 sturmovik cliffs of
dover\parts\bob\mission\campaign. The campaign will then install and
replace your existing Luftwaffe campaign in the campaigns menu.
If
you do not choose your game directory, the campaign folder
(campaign_de) will be placed in your My Documents folder. To uninstall
you can simply ‘verify’ your game in Steam and it will restore your game
to its original condition, but this will also remove any other mods you
may have installed.
If you wish to uninstall manually, a backup
of your stock Luftwaffe campaign can be found inside the campaign_de
folder called ‘campaign_de.zip’. Just copy this zip file onto your
desktop, delete the existing campaign_de file, and unzip the old
campaign into the C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\SteamApps\common\il-2
sturmovik cliffs of dover\parts\bob\mission\campaign directory.
REDUX and the ‘Open Battlefield’ conceptREDUX
campaigns are built on an ‘Open Battlefield’ concept. This means
mission events do not center around the player, rather the player is
just one part of a dynamic ongoing war. At the time of your mission,
other Luftwaffe and British aircraft will be flying and executing their
own missions, completely unrelated to yours. While you are flying East
to attack Manston, you may see German bombers headed West to attack
Tangmere. You may be tasked to execute a straightforward ground attack
on a neighbouring British airfield, and see a nice, juicy unescorted RAF
bomber flight cross your path shortly after takeoff. On the ground,
German and British forces will clash and the front line will be
constantly moving from mission to mission.
We do not employ
spawn triggers to set up meetings between the player and other friendly
or enemy flights. This may be an easy way to guarantee the player some
action, but is completely unrealistic. In combat, pilots were assigned
precise take off, rendezvous and ingress times and other units and
actions depended on their ability to execute to these.
Whether
you as a player follow the waypoints assigned in a mission briefing is
entirely up to you – if you are flight leader, the route you take is
yours to decide, but it will have consequences. In REDUX missions, if
you miss an escort rendezvous because of poor navigation or timing, you
will miss the rendezvous, and your bombers may get slaughtered. If you
are sent to intercept incoming bombers and spend too much time on the
deck, or miss a waypoint, you can miss the intercept, and the bombers
will get through unscathed. If you do not take the route outlined in
your briefing, you may avoid enemy contact – or you may meet a superior
RAF force en-route to their own target.
How plausible is the Seelöwe Luftwaffe REDUX campaign storyline?The
original CoD Luftwaffe missions have been extensively reworked, based
on the notes from a Royal Military Academy Sandhurst wargame conducted
in 1974 to simulate a September 1940 invasion by Germany. (See Readme).
In
this exercise, each side (played by actual British and German officers
respectively) was based in a command room, and the moves plotted on a
scale model of SE England constructed at the School of Infantry. The
panel of umpires included Luftwaffe ace Adolf Galland, Admiral Friedrich
Ruge, Air Chief Marshal Sir Christopher Foxley-Norris, Rear Admiral
Edward Gueritz, General Heinz Trettner and Major General Glyn Gilbert.
The main assumptions were that:
a) the Luftwaffe had not yet won air supremacy;
b)
the possible invasion dates were constrained by the weather and tides
(for a high water attack); and c) it had taken until late September to
assemble the necessary shipping.
´
One
of the clever tactics used by the German planners in this wargame, to
secure the success of the initial landings in Britain, was a decoy
‘invasion fleet’ which sailed from Norway toward the North of England.
By setting out from Norway with a force of heavy warships escorting
merchant ships, and allowing themselves to be spotted on a course for
the north of England, the Kriegsmarine convinced the British commanders a
‘pincer’ movement of landings in the north, and south, was underway.
The Royal Navy was forced to send the British Home Fleet into the North
Sea to try to intercept the decoy fleet, and rely on its more vulnerable
destroyer squadrons to intercept the Channel invasion.
The
Sandhurst wargame concluded that with good weather, this strategy could
have succeeded in allowing the first wave of German troops to get
ashore. The storyline for this campaign closely follows the events of
the Sandhurst wargame.
In addition to the Sandhurst wargame, this
campaign draws on the work of British and German historians and writers
such as Peter Fleming, Egbert Keiser, Richard Cox and Derek Robinson,
whose analyses provide inspiration for the political back story you will
see unfolding in the Seelöwe REDUX campaign.
