Last night I'm flying around in a Spitfire looking for some fun. I spot a con upping out of 24, its a 109. Oh boy, historic matchup. I let him take off (coulda vulched, ack was down). He leaves the airfield vicinity, coming toward me, and dives into a cavern, I dive after him. Our noses pass (no HO), I reverse up into a loop and start pursuit. He's slowly pulling away, but I chase. He starts grabbing alt... no way I can climb with him, so I keep my speed and stay low. He extends until he's about 4.0k away and starts heading back to me. I position myself until he's diving in from my 8 o'clock, I break left into his dive and evade him, he zooms back up to his perch. I stay in the canyons because I know he'll have to get low and slow to get me there. He BnZ's on me, I evade... this goes on for a good ten mnutes.
At this point I'm thinking... this is great, this is why I play this game. A well-matched set of planes, a well-matched couple of pilots, some great terrain to fly in (I love Mindanao), a historic opponent (109 vs Spit) and not the usual N1Ks or LA7s that I see EVERYWHERE, no heroes swooping in stealing kills while the others are busy. A dogfight that was based on tactics and strategy, not uber UFO gamey dweeb or gangbang tactics. This fight was the most satisfying that I've had in a long time.
I look at my fuel gauge... rats! 1/8 left, time to rtb. So as the 109 is in the middle of one of his extensions, I reluctantly break off and head for home. I'm smiling... I type into the radio "<S!> 109 @ 24. great fight. I'm bingo. RTB."
Silence.
Oh well, I'm heading for home, about halfway there. The whole time I'm keeping an eye on the 109, and see that he's now chasing me again, slowly catching up. I am verrrry low on fuel so I get as near to home as I can before he dives in on me. I dive into a canyon and break into his dive, and for the next 3 minutes we're having the same great fight again, but this time it's getting tighter, getting closer, my undersides scraping the canyon walls. Finally I get him at the top of a loop... I'm under him, just about stalling... I get a good burst into his tail and see his elevators come off. As I'm hanging on my prop, my engine sputters to a stop, and as I flop over to begin my glide in, I see his chute pop open. I'm just beaming at this point. What fun that was!
In white text in the buffer, private message comes in...
"Stupid Spitfires ruin this stupid game..."
"I can't fight in the canyons against a Spit that can turn on a stupid dime at 1 mph..."
As my Spit brakes precariously to a halt in one of the canyon valleys, I give the guy another chance, and send him a great big sloppy <S!> over the open channel. This time I know his name.
back at me on private channel..
"blah blah stupid blah blah..."
I send him my own private message.
"So I guess I'm just gonna have to take that as a Salute then, huh?"
Silence.
I logged off in disgust.
Since when is it all about winning? Is it score-whoring, stats, perks, ranks, etc., that brings this attitude out of people? Is it some kind of "my plane has a top speed 2.375 kts faster than his, therefore I should win all the time" stat-quoting, bean-counting mentality? Just what the hell is it that people expect from this game?
Or is it me? Am I just getting burnt out?
