This raises some questions for me....
When you think about it, many roles fulfilled by a helicopter do not, in fact, usually require off-airport vertical take-off and landing, just the ability to hover or perform a low-speed orbit around a point on the ground.
Are there any other examples of aircraft that can hover, or nearly so, but still take-off and land horizontally? Are there any projects or prototypes of aircraft which have proposed that kind of operation?
Off the top of my head I can only think of the Vought XF5U-1 Flying Flapjack, which was expected to be able to hover as well as perform super-STOL operations with those big radial engines powering enormous, flapping variable pitch props. Any more?
Cheers,
Matthew