Hehe, I knew with a title like that,
everyone would read it
I have been playing AH for two weeks now, and was pleased to get a k/d ratio of 2/1, with many of those deaths ascribed to experimental things. I believe that a game with strategy like AH cannot be learned in 2 weeks. 2 months, well maybe…
Yesterday, I thought I’d have a major strategy learning session. I watched as C47s made supply drops, and ground vehicles did their thing.
One of the differences between AH and WB that becomes immediately apparent is the ferocity of weapons in AH, especially the gun emplacements (or acks) at airfields, and the guns on PT boats. The only way I can kill a PT boat is to drop a 1000# bomb on it. That needs to be a very accurate drop, and the scope for missing the target is large. Yesterday I did manage to strafe one while flying a P38L, but only because the boat driver was distracted and was firing at another of my friends. Otherwise, if a PT boat fires at me as I try to get close enough to shoot at it, I’m dead. Can anyone advise? I must have died 6 deaths as I struggled to kill a boat.
As for killing acks, it would seem that a solo raid of a field is not an option; by the time I can get close enough to see the acks and start firing, they are already firing back and I am soon dead. Even bombing acks would need the drop to be made from a safe height, and I can’t see how a jabo fighter could achieve this with sufficient accuracy. Any tips?
Not surprisingly, the planes are modelled differently in Aces High and WB2. (I don’t know about WB3 – didn’t like that much) Yesterday, I thought I’d risk a few perk points by flying the F4U1C. (8 pp) I was near the surface of the sea, and was attacked by a 190, which I later found out was a D9. It was closing on me fast, and the only evasive manoeuvre I could think of was to split-S and hope that if the faster moving 190 tried to follow, he would auger into the drink. He did not. Instead, he performed a chandelle manoeuvre and resumed the chase. Having extended the gap between us to 850 yards, I thought there was no way he could catch me. Wrong! Here he comes again, gaining on me quite rapidly. OK, I’ll try turning to bleed his E (and mine). 190s are not supposed to like turning, but – surprise, surprise – the 190D9 has no trouble turning with me at all. In WB, the 190 would have blown all his E turning like that, and may well have augured as a result. Still, I always believed that the D9 in WB was porked. It flew like a bloated pig. In WB the only 190 I got on with was the A4. In AH it seems that they are all formidable.
I’m interested to hear your comments about the above
Finally, yesterday I did the deed. I cancelled my WB account. I had held back thinking that I would feel sorrow at doing this, but I felt nothing. I had thought I might want to revisit WB from time to time, but after 2 weeks in AH I just know I’ll never want to go back to WB. At the risk of offending some WB snoopers of this board, I shall state some of the reasons. And those are the incomplete nature of WB3, whose graphics are not as good as AH graphics, the endless problems with bad connections to which no solution was ever forthcoming (never knowing whether my guns would have any effect from one hour to the next), the constant fiddling about with various settings – including “Otto” gun defence on bombers, the scoring system, the World War 2 arena fragfest and side switching, and the almost complete lack of response to any player initiatives – well mine anyway <lol>. Oh, and the lack of documentation advising what ordnance was required to destroy strategic targets, which itself was subject to change without notice.
I shall miss some of my buddies, especially my Dutch squad, but I will see them at the Eurocon in Holland next year. As to missing the game, I was playing so little during the last months that there’s little to miss. As one recently departed WB pilot (now a curmudgeon) put it,
”the game I knew, and loved, is dead”.
