playing 100% realism here, I take off from the airfield and just get messages saying were is my escort, but I cant find the dornier all I can see is 3 109s that take off before me and head out over the coast. I try to catch them up.... then I get a you failed the mission. what am I doing wrong?

If you take off the airfield you wont be able to win the mission. The dornier is west north west of your takeoff location . He is heading east northeast.
If you make an airstart your wingmen will help you fighting the spits. I tried it dozens of times with starting from the ground. But iwthout help you have no chance downing 6 spits before they kill the dornier.
When airstarting you have like 6 BFs helping you in this fight thus leaving you realistic chances.

Winger

Well, this german campaign for shure was added as a afterthought.
I shure hope that when the big problems are solved we'll get something better, be it from maddox games or from talented users.

I have to say I'm terribly disappointed with the campaigns so far. Not that they are THAT bad per se, but after all this time I really had hoped for more.