Piloting Quick Start Guide

We recommend that you familiarize yourself with the aircraft and how to fly them OFFLINE before venturing out in the Campaign - it will save supply and a ton of embarrassment.

Find the aircraft and find the field
Offline, an expanding menu system lists all the available units in WWIIOL. Click on the minus and plus signs to expand or contract the menu until you see a spread of aircraft in the ”Fighters” and ”Bombers” categories. Click to select an aircraft, and punch the ”Enter World” button. You will now spawn in the Offline Training area. Alternatively, you may also select any airfield from the game map and spawn there if you want to see what WWIIOL really looks like. To do so, first click to select your aircraft type, then use the town search function on the game map and type in e.g. "Brussels" or "Gilze". Zoom in on the map with the scroll wheel until you see the little aircraft icon denoting an Airfield facility: select this facility and hit the “Enter World” button.

Online, select an Air Force Persona to see available brigades and their missions. Join any mission and select your aircraft of choice in the Ready Room – as a beginner you will only see a single type available to you. If you do not reserve a particular aircraft before hitting the “Enter World” button, you will be saddled with the default lowest-value aircraft available. If the spawn list is empty, select another brigade until you find a crate waiting.

Spawned in
Upon spawning in to the game world you will find yourself sitting in the pilot’s seat looking directly forward, on the ground (offline) and just inside a mighty fine hangar (online). There are no “air starts” and no automatic takeoff feature in WWIIOL – here, you are expected to earn your laurels yourself!

Look out the windows while moving the joystick from side to side and from front to back: if the ailerons (the movable panels at the wings’ trailing edges) and the elevator (the horizontal control panel in the tail unit) move up and down you know that your joystick is working. If you fly with mouse and keyboard move the mouse sideways while looking out the side (numpad 4 or 6 to look left/right) and verify that the ailerons are working. Now start your engine(s) with the E key – sometimes it takes a few seconds to catch and settle into a steady drone. Now you’re ready to take off – almost! Before ramming the throttle forward to crash into the opposite hangar or the purposely-planted treeline in front of you, follow this simple routine:

Always follow this routine
1. Set Max RPM with ' key twice.
2. Start the engine (E).
3. Throttle up just a little bit to get you rolling (mouse wheel or throttle slider set to rz axis in Keymapper).
4. Taxi very slowly to the far side of the field. Steer with brakes (Z, X) and rudder. Lock/unlock tailwheel (/) as necessary to assist steering.
5. Line up the entire length of the field before you.
6. Throttle up and start rolling. Push joystick/mouse forward just a tad to lift the tail off the ground - this will minimize the swinging tendency.
7. Correct to a straight heading with short taps of opposite brake or opposite rudder. E.g. if the crate swings to left, tap right brake (X) or use right rudder to counteract. Give opposite aileron as necessary to counteract a rolling tendency.
8. Roll the entire length of the field and gently nudge the aircraft up - no wild yanking or you will crash.
9. Crank up the landing gear (G) and build speed, at least 250 km/h or 150 mph before you try anything fancy.

Here is a decent video to get you going.

Further reading
Takeoff is harder than it sounds, as you will surely experience. Read more about Basic Flight Maneuvers, including takeoff and landing, or select an aircraft with tricycle gear (P38, P39) instead of the normal “taildragger” type aircraft (Bf-110, Hurricane, H75).

Some aircraft have multiple positions such as tail gunners, co-pilots and bombardiers. Use the standard numbered keys (1-9) to jump to these positions. The pilot is of course in the number 1 slot when you wish to return to the controls. The use of air gunners and bombardiers is thoroughly covered in the Air Gunners and Bombardiers section of this manual.

To open fire, press F or your primary joystick trigger (left click on mouse). To fire with secondary armament (usually cannons), press B or your secondary joystick trigger/toggle. If your fighter carries bomb(s), you may be required to select them by hitting backspace before you can deploy them with the B key. Bombers, with some exceptions covered in detail in the Strategic Bombing and Close Air Support sections, require you to open bomb bay doors (D) and drop bombs in the bombardier position (2 key) using the secondary trigger (B).

Continue to Basic Flight Maneuvers

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