Update Effective 5/5/19
Participant campaign ribbon and individual awards and recognition posted. Special thanks to all the pilots of RoF and FC WWI flight sim community who supported and participated in this years event and made it successful once again! Awards may be viewed on the official event forum by clicking here
Update Effective 4/25/19
This Saturday from 1700 UTC - 2300 UTC is the last mission in this year's
RoF Bloody April Campaign.
Avoid disappointment or frustration ....help your team plan for victory!
Sign up now on the weekly pilot roster if you have not already done so!
1. Be sure to log in to the Jasta 5 Bloody April campaign event forum
http://www.jasta5.or...0b187bb7e3ffa18
2. Navigate to your team's operations area (it should appear WHEN LOGGED IN
at the bottom of the page linked above)
3. Use the link on the weekly sign up thread to indicate the latest time
you can fly to before listing the earliest time you can fly during the six
hour mission.
Only pilots who have reserved a spot on the roster to fly EACH WEEK can be
confident of a spot.
There is plenty of opportunity for everyone to fly during the six hour mission, just not at the same
time....reserve your space today!
Update Effective 3/31/19
Updated rules were uploaded to the forum with highlights in red. Some things worthy of note here found in the rules:
One six (6) hour mission each week starting at 1700 GMT/UTC ending 2300 GMT/UTC.
In order to be victorious, each side must manage the number of pilots flying to insure coverage throughout the entire mission. To support Commanders in accomplishing this and to reflect the historical fact that Entente air resources outnumbered Central, there are asymmetrical limits on pilot slots. Entente pilot slots will outnumber the Central pilot supply by approximately 3:2. The event organizers reserve the right to alter these limits and ratios in order to facilitate a fair event that follows as closely as possible, the historical realities.
To be victorious, a side will need to schedule pilots to fly throughout the entire mission; not just the 1700 GMT/UTC start time. If you can fly as late as 2300 GMT/UTC but your schedule or preference is not to fly the entire 6 hours, no problem! Report on the weekly pilot schedule in your sides event operations forum that you are available for a later start time until 2300 GMT/UTC. If you wanted to fly only two hours, you would report a start time of 2100 UTC with a end time of 2300 UTC.
Death penalty = reduced from 2 hours to 30 minutes with backseat gunnery allowed during the penalty period. Based on feedback from community partners.
Update Effective 3/30/19
Teams are assigned. Log in to see your team assignment. You will see Blue/Central or Red/Entente operations depending on your side. You must have a forum account to access. See link below to login or register. Rules will be posted later Saturday but no later than Sunday.
Update Effective 3/12/19
Event forum and pilot check-in is active. You must have a forum account to access.
If you can't remember log in use the forgot password function which will send you a access link to your email.
http://www.jasta5.or...b91d392d65a3ea5
Update Effective 3/9/19
Thank you for those of you who have participated in the poll and are planning on flying. We know from past experience there will be more participating than have responded here and that is exciting! A few updates are below and more information will be flowing in the coming few weeks.
Schedule:
March 30th - Bloody April Server Test
April 1 - April 5 - Bloody April Open Server Practice Missions (and Monday - Friday the following weeks)
April 6 - Hostilities begin (1700-2300 GMT/UTC)
April 13 - Hostilities continue (1700-2300 GMT/UTC)
April 20 - Easter Truce - no missions
April 27 - Hostilities conclude (1700-2300 GMT/UTC)
April 28 - Results and Awards
Rules and Scoring:
We will be updating the last years rule set as appropriate to explain this years format along with the new scoring system and other details. Released as soon as possible prior to the event.
Event Forum:
The Jasta 5 event forum is currently available Visit it here. Importa t updates posted there to participants. You must log in or create an account to view and post.
Plane Set:
Plane set scout matchup will feature Nieuport 11s/17s & Spad 150/180s against Alb D.IIs/D.IIIs.
Team Assignments:
We anticipate using the same teams that were used in Black September which seemed balanced and fair. A final determination will be made on "sides" and communicated out in the coming weeks.
Event Announcement (Feb 26, 2019):
The Last Hurrah - A Proposal To The Community for Bloody April IX,
Jasta 5 has been proud to put on the Bloody April event in Rise of Flight for the last eight years. Our event has changed with the community as we have continually tried to innovate through mission and campaign design to sustain interest in a simulation platform that is now without question out of date. We are absolutely going to have Bloody April IX on Rise of Flight in 2019, but it is highly possible that this will be the last one Jasta 5 hosts in Rise of Flight. While we (and this thread) is not intending to debate pros and cons of ROF over Flying Circus or to tell you to support 1C Studios by purchasing FC, Jasta 5 is actively transitioning into Flying Circus. We're already planning to move Black September over this fall, if possible, following the anticipated release of the Arras map in FC.
The pilots of Jasta 5 would like to invite everyone who has flown Rise of Flight and Bloody April to join us in giving Rise of Flight a proper send off as a thanks for years of entertainment and comradery with friends around the world which many of us enjoyed for nearly a decade. A "last hurrah" if you will that people would be willing to come back for... just one last time...until our campaigns migrate over to Flying Circus. At the same time, we would invite those virtual pilots, new to the WWI air combat community and FC, to join the larger WWI air combat community in this campaign. In the end, we are all part of a larger community of WWI flight sim enthusiasts (and RoF is dirt cheap for anyone needing to purchase it in order to join in this world wide campaign that has regularly drawn 100 pilot registrations each year.
So what about this years event......
Core Components of the Proposal - taking into account a variety of player requests and feedback over many years.
- Flight operations on the three weekends in April not including Easter (3rd) weekend.
- Set sides, no switching, similar to early Bloody April Campaigns.
- No Player Mods Required (we will NOT use the Arras map, although we may play in "mods on" mode for the benefits of some server side tweaks)
- The backdrop will be the 2nd Battle of the Asine near Reims. This is a throwback to Bloody April V. Plane set scout matchup will feature Nieuport 11s/17s & Spad 150/180s against Alb D.IIs/D.IIIs.
- Unequal missions and objectives. This will not be a mirrored campaign. Central and Entente forces are attempting at achieve different things. Play will focus with the Entente being required to take more offensive actions over Central territory. Central forces and plane inventories will be smaller overall, which is also a throwback to earlier Bloody Aprils.
- Traditional "scoring" by subtitle is replaced with a new totally log based system that keeps track of all types of missions completed (yes even things like photo recons and artillery spotting), takes into account the historical rate of infantry casualties on both sides, as well as the impact of the missions pilots complete, as well as the total number of hours flown, pilots lost/captured, etc. and in the end will be woven together into a story that outlines the detailed statistics and events that occur. Both sides will in essence be competing against the historical numbers of the actual campaign instead of against each other for points.
- Open server campaign schedule instead of a few hour window (jump in when you can, do what you can, get out, and come back). Dawn, Daytime and Dusk missions. Dawn and dusk missions are different than daytime operations and limited in number.
- Harsher death penalties are back. 1 hour death enforced by the server settings, although you may serve as a backseat gunner during the downtime. The open campaign schedule makes this less impactful and gives pilots more opportunities overall to get in the air.
- Randomization galore. Depending on the final format (see poll below) plane sets will rotate randomly hourly with options for "reserve", "normal", and "front line" loadouts at each individual airfield. Mission objectives reset an hour after completion, and locations move randomly each time so that nothing gets stagnant.
What we're asking from those of you who have flown or would be interested in flying in this years campaign is some input. Taking the above statements into account, we want to get a sense of how many pilots would really willing to throw on their old flight jacket and goggles for this style event in ROF at this point, and to get a sense for how "intense" the event should be in terms of flight operations being available to get maximum turnout.
Don't forget the poll at the top.
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