now I have it on film!!!

[RAM]

Look I'm really tiiiired of the long range Buff uberfire. REALLY TIRED!!!!...lets see...I was on a P38 following a B26. I tried a surprise attack but my gunnery as always,sucked. I got distance on it and I SPRAYED (pings ALL AROUND THE PLANE) during nearly 1-2 seconds from 900-1k yds...no effect. No damage no nothing!!!!!!:...I go down pull out ,shoot (and miss), and I try to go down again. he pings me ONCE (1 time, 1 sound...) and he DESTROYS my engine from 800 yds on a DEFLECTION shoot.

Look,no way. I am tired of this. In any fighter this would have been a ditch for me. And it was, because while landing I stalled and ploooof!!!. The B26 was UNSCATHED...now...where is here the realism?...mmm???...12.7 pings, 20mm pings and he goes singing while I see one of my engines stop because ONE ping...
but man,no, this wasnt the worse...no no...I still tried to catch the bomber but I couldnt. the B-26 kept firing me and HIT ME AGAIN FROM 1.8K!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1.8K=1800yds=1700meters=1.7Kms...looooooooong distance...Loooooooong way....and he hits me. eventually he got one of my MGs. so he DAMAGED me from 1.8K while I did nothing to him from 1K!!!!

NO WAY,this is not realistic. This is a deeeep blaaaaack hole into AH, along with ack!

Please Fix the damned Sniper-firing bomber guns!!!

This isnt the first time this happens to me. But is the first time I film it!! so I have probes!!!!!!!!!...

BTW,I checked packet loss...I usually have 10-25% loss. this time I cheched and I had only 5% packet loss.

As I said,please Fix this!

[This message has been edited by RAM (edited 03-01-2000).]

[indian]

Ram not saying what you saw was wrong but if you were on the B26' 6and you saw 800yds he might have seen 500yds it a net lag thing. pretty sure it is the same for AH as other games are. Yuo can take about 2 to 300 yds off when you look at the 6 of a nme. Ifyou get behind a friendly ask him what he sees. It should be the same thing. I have seen this before could be same here in AH.

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Tommy (INDIAN) Toon
  1st Aces High Trainer Crew
Home of The Allied Fighter Wing A.F.W.
A.F.W. Homepage

[weazel]

I drove a p-38 off from D-1.6 in a B-26 tonite. Ram dive below them to keep the tail gun from hitting you and pull up into their belly and you have a better chance of killing them.

[wells]

Also, keep in mind that you are flying towards his bullets, while he's flying away from yours.

[coyote]

haha RAM , there u going trying to ditch again...  

I get irratated with the uber large shell radius guns in the buffs too, but when I calm down, I realize its hard for 1 man (usually, sometimes 2 men) to fly the plane and man all the guns. Make a smart attack and the buff will explode on 1st pass and you will escape untouched. I can kill buffs at will when I take the "time" to set up the attack. "time" is the key word.

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Coyote

[Duckwing6]

what coyote said .. attack them from the sides from slightly underneath (prefferable fron quarter) and you'll be presented with
a) a BIG FAT TARGET (tail)
b) the least guns he bear on you
c) a real nice kill message after he blew up

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Phillip "Duckwing6" Artweger
Flight Officer "E" Flight
Skeleton Crew

[This message has been edited by Duckwing6 (edited 03-02-2000).]

[bloom25]

I had the same type of thing happen.  Granger and I chased down a b26.  He intercepted first and according to him poured tons of ammo into it.  I then intercepted the bomber and it appeared to have no damage.  I then landed about 35 hits directly on the b26's rudder.  (I was using 109 with 30mm + gondolas.  I used ALL of my 30mm before I was destroyed with 1 ping.)  I never saw any tracers from the bomber as well.  Granger and I called up the bomber and he reported no damage at all.  

Something has GOT to be wrong somewhere.  (Unfortunately I did not film this fight.)

Rubber bullets all over again???  I hope not.

bloom25
THUNDERBIRDS

[eskimo]

RAM,
Speaking for those of us who spend 1/2 or more of our time in BUFFs, we think that the odds already favor the fighters plenty.
In tour 1; B-17's have enjoyed 2402 kills at the expense of 4340 deaths. That is not a great ratio, especially if you consider that the BUFFS spend 3 to 5 times the amount of time getting to altitude and to enemy teritory as the fighters must spend to intercept them.
B-26's have 4095 kills, at the cost of 5917 deaths, a little better than the B-17, but still, a far worse ratio than any fighter experiences.
Fighters always have the choice to engage a bomber, or not.  They can also wait untill they have a clear advantage before attacking.
Personally, I would like to see Gunner improvements, such as automatically switching to the next gun when it is moved to the extent of it's track. IE, track a target down from the tail and automatically switch to the ball when the gun travel hits bottom.
I would like to suggest that you spend about 1/3 of your time in BUFFs for awhile and then tell us what you think of the BUFFs leathality.
Don't forget that there must be an incentive to fly any particular plane. No one wants to just fly around and be someone's cannon fodder, which is often what BUFF driving is!
eskimo

[fats]

--- Indian: ---
but if you were on the B26' 6and you saw 800yds he might have seen 500yds it a net lag thing.
--- end ---

Actually it's the other way around. If you are on someone's six, you will see the shorter distance. Hence HT has made buffs' gunners be able to hit from longer ranges to compensate for this effect.


//fats

[spinny]

"I get irratated with the uber large shell radius guns in the buffs too, but when I calm down, I realize its hard for 1 man (usually, sometimes 2 men) to fly the plane and man
all the guns."

Hitech has said the the effective range of the buff's guns is greater than that of the fighters for the above reason and to prevent a fighter from just sitting on a buff's 6 and
hosing away. As for hits not causing any damage, well, as others have said, lag, dropped packets, and so forth. On one-ping kills: if the code is like it is in WBs (probably is), one ping can equal many hits-- what you hear isn't what you get. Besides that, even it was only one round into an inline engine, the engine could be killed.

These days, if I don't have an alt advantage on a buff or a big speed advantage, I think twice about taking him on.

[Swager]

I was pinged many times by a B26 from 1.3-1.4 while I was slowly pulling away from it (Trying to extend).  Ended up shooting me down at around 1.6.  It was my mistake for getting caught like that, but ya know!!      

No big deal because I get shot down all the time,  but I thought this was a bit unusual!

Just mark it off as a lesson learned!!    

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JG2 "Richthofen"

[This message has been edited by Swager (edited 03-02-2000).]

[This message has been edited by Swager (edited 03-02-2000).]

[Vermillion]

I can feel for you  

My personal policy is to just not attack bombers anymore. Its just not worth it.

The other night I started a high speed 10 to 2 pass on a B-17 and I got pilot pinged from 1.8 at about 400 IAS on the buffs first shot.

Strange that my x6 .50 cals can't down a buff in two or three high quality passes, but his x2 or x4 depending on angle can totally rip my fighter in half with a half second burst at two or three times the distance.

Between Stratosphere Buffs and the Uberguns, I just don't consider them worth the frustration anymore.

Totally ridiculous.

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Vermillion
**MOL**, Men of Leisure,
"Real Men fly Radials, Nancy Boys fly Spitfires"

[RAM]

For the buff people:
Lets see, I understand that the gunnery must be improved for you, cuz you are one or two in the lone buff. What I dont understand is that ONE ping at 800yds (in my computer) of 12.7mms kills one engine,and 1-2 seconds of 12.7mm and 20mms pings DO NO DAMAGE to a B-26 at 900-1k yds (again in my computer). And about those pings at 1.8K...LOL!!!!!!! please make a gunnery award in AH...lets see who hits me at the longest range!!!  

Something is VERY wrong here!!!!!! P38a had VERY concentrated fire and the 20mm was a Hispano!!!!!. Look I understand that a 12.7mm single ping can kill an engine. Also can do nastier things: Tuesday I followed a B26,  I sprayed it and he exploded...just after killing my pilot,again with only ONE ping.
 I dont complain about it, I accept it as a possible situation, after all I also made the bomber go boom. But what happened this time is COMPLETELY different. and this must be fixed. 12.7mm on bombers can be more accurate for playing reasons, but please dont make them uberaccurate 37mms!!!!!

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Ram, out

JG2 "Richthofen"

 

[This message has been edited by RAM (edited 03-02-2000).]

[CavemanJ]

RAM I see you have 2 kills w/ 3 deaths in the 17, and 4 kills w/ 7 deaths in the 26, with a total of 49 buff sorties in tour 1.

I have 92 kills w/ 85 deaths in the 17 and 246 kills w/ 93 deaths in the 26, with a total sortie count of 448.
Now, before you go sayin my B26 K/D just helps prove your point, I have only landed 113 of those 448 sorties.  I have 25 discoes, 94 bails, 32 ditches, and a total of 184 deaths.  All of the bails and a little better than half of the ditches came from enemy action.  Also note that the 26 is the bird I use when we sneak attack a field, and the vast majority of those kills are from vulching (I have more kills from dropping bombs on people OTR than from sittin on the spawn point in me 26, for the record).

The .50s are FUBAR'ed and have been since around version .48-.49.  I believe this comes from the tweaking to the damage models of the birds.  Back in beta tour 2 someone (though I can't remember who) said the .50s were turned down for play balance issues (why w/ 20mm and 30mm flyin I'll never understand).  As the damage models were tweaked and the fighters were made harder, the .50s weren't turned up.  Keep in mind this is personal speculation, garnered from experience in the arena.

Once upon a time I could take a lone B17 into enemy territory at 15k, w/o escorts, pick up 5-6 kills, and nurse my wounded fortress home to land (or atleast ditch at a friendly field).  Now it's suicide to even attempt that w/o mutliple fighter escorts because the .50s have lost thier teeth.  Once I was confident that I was untouchable (as long as I had ammo), but now I start to really sweat any bandits that close, because more often than not the bandit kills me and I've got a 50/50 chance of killing him.  There have been way too many times I've pumped 2-3 seconds worth of fire into an attacking bandit only to get killed and him fly away with no damage, or maybe missing an aileron.  And I'm talking 2-3 seconds of SOLID hits, hit sprites from the time I squeeze the trigger til the time I die.  My connection usually runs 140-160pings w/ no packet loss, and it damn sure ain't my gunner skills.  There are many of the experienced pilots that'll tell you they're very wary of approaching my buffs, even with the toothless wonders I have for guns.

Maybe I should start shooting much farther out.  I usually hold my fire until about 1.1k, and then I only fire if they're actually turned in and committed to an attack.  The reason for this is I have never gotten a kill beyond 1.1k on my front end, and the ones at 1.1k are the spray and pray spits that hang back at that distance and more often than not take one of my wings and fly away undamaged after absorbing 5-6 seconds of solid hits from my guns.

And HTC, if the weak .50s are some kind of ploy to try and get more buff formations in the arena, shame on you, and fix'em.

[This message has been edited by CavemanJ (edited 03-02-2000).]

[eskimo]

In tour 2, from bombers, I have scored 109 gunner hits, downing a ME-109 and 3 Spits.  Thats an average of 27 hits per plane killed.  Probably pretty typical for 50 cals.
I am the furthest thing from an expert, but I also suspect that "what you hear" is not neccessarily "what you get".
I do know, however, that a buff can appear undamaged but yet be hurting.  Buffs also have lots of uncritical parts, to which you can punch many holes without causing a major faliure.
eskimo