There's no advantage of less weight.
Yes there is, a Jug at 50% fuel weighs less then one at 100%. Relative weight between the 2 is not in question. Some planes just weigh more regardless of fuel load. That’s not what I said at all. If you follow the context of my reply you see I was responding to Karnak when he said
If you simply force 100% then all long range aircraft will simply fly around at full MIL power all the time.
My reply to that specific point was that they do this anyway now but with less then 100% internal by carrying drop tanks.
If you take a dt and 50% fuel, as you said, you get the benefit of longer range(Dt) and once you drop the tank you get the advantage of the reduced weight (50% fuel as opposed to 75 or 100) during combat. With the Dt you can fly at mil power the whole time so you get the advantage of a high speed "cruise".
The typh otoh hand may burn more fuel and have less then 100% when it reaches combat but does so at reduced range and duration (combat time). The only way to gain range is to reduce cruise speed and restrict combat time.
Leaving it at 2 is fine as long as the planes with low fuel capacity can still take off with 100% fuel. If the fuel tanks at the fields stay the target of suicide players then there’s no reason for me to bother flying in the main if the choice is between long flight times from rear bases (effectively limiting combat time but with added boredom of a longer flight; Read GS’s flight profile) or upping for 6 min sorties at a front line field that has its fuel porked.
I was all for what Pyro talked about in Vulcan’s “engine management thread”. But after actually flying under those restrictions I realized that it effects the planes I fly with reduced combat time, and/or slower cruise speeds and the effects of fuel porking on my choice of rides make the AH2 main less attractive then AH1s.
IL2/FB may use the artificial “fly XX min at XX power setting or your eng will over heat” but there’s no fuel mod. Players fly at reduced power settings to keep their eng cool so that when they enter combat they can fight longer at full power. I had thought that the way fuel management was being modeled in AH2 that it would be a better solution and that players would fly at lower power settings to conserve fuel so that when they enter combat they can fight longer at full power. Well the result is only some planes are effected while others are not. The planes affected are the planes I fly.
