Great writing as usual Tusk...
Your posts are the stuff of good threads. Obviously, underneath it all, the fm issue comes to the surface. With the current plane set, the way we fight in the wwi arena favors the DR until a pilot gets really good in one of the other three planes available. To get good, you have to die some in front of a DR. Most folks have trouble taking the ego out of flying and dying a lot in order to gain the required experience.
Then there are folks, a bunch in fact, that simply like the DR for either historic reasons or for the way it handles. They should not feel guilty about flying a DR. I'm not one of those, but have liked the plane and enjoy flying it.
I know you have flown in a number of wwi sims. In the first one I visited (to many years ago - was almost young then), the camel was far and away the plane of choice...until some folks started exploring b'nz flying. Took a little more patience, but you could not catch a carefully flown Se5 with a camel and the result was that they could peck you to death in your camel. Was very frustrating for camel pilots...got people into other rides.
I carried a camel bias into another sim...and, in that sim the camel did not have the slot between the wings. I felt like I was flying stone blind. You could always look over the top wing of a DR...so we went there and had great fun.
About 10 years ago...the PS was a powerful squad, you might recall that time and place. We sometimes had 30 people in the arena flying together. Our CO at the time was Skarp, who flew here for a few weeks when this game was first introduced. This same issue was alive then...everyone in a camel. Skarp decided to take the consensus (at that time) worst fighter in that plane set, the F2B, and fly it for a TOD. What a surprise, he got good at it and that plane proved a match for anything if flown within its strengths. We see that in this arena when "X" gets in the same plane. We used to call it the "Kung Pao Raider". There was an evening when Mano, Sleepy (you remember VonSleep), and several others got in F2B and attacked the large pack of camels and DR's fighting at the traditional furball field until they came on channel 100 and asked us to please go away...they could not effectively fight a pack of Kung Pao Raiders.
Everything you say and imply is true. The DR is easier to fly successfully, once you learn the basics; for most people learning to fly wwi planes and even the greater number learning these specific fm's when they already know how to fly wwi planes. The AH version is still very young. There are usually too few people in the arena for even small effective furball action. Each of the planes has distinct advantages. If the arena continues to grow and evolve, there may well be a night when the DR guys ask the F2B pilots to please fly at another field - they have already been asked not to use the tail gun.
The down side of the DR dominance is if all the best pilots are in DR's and they decide to run up stats killing newer less experienced pilots...the arena could go empty before it matures and pilots learn how to fly the other rides. Of course, that is really more a behavior issue for the most experienced pilots.
Sorry to be so long winded. My only point is that even with a mature set of pilots and evolved game, there are those who enjoy flying the DR for a number of valid reasons other than killing a bunch of new pilots. Those pilots should not be embarrassed to be out there with three wings. An arena-wide perspective like that would be an equal deterrent to the evolution of the arena.
Sure enjoy your posts I do.
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